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GIFT  OF 
Publisher 


STORY-TELLING,  QUESTIONING 
AND  STUDYING 


380ofej5  bg  tfte  Same  ^ut^or 


Published  by  The  Macmillan  CoMPAmr 

THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  EDUCATION 

295  pages.    New  York,  1904. 

PSYCHOLOGICAL  PRINCIPLES   OF  EDUCATION 
435  pages.     New  York,  1907. 

IDEALISM  IN  EDUCATION 

183  pages.    New  York,  1910. 

FREE  WILL  AND  HUMAN  RESPONSIBILITY 

197  pages.     New  York,  1912. 


Published  by  The  Association  Press 

THE  LEADERSHIP  OF  BIBLE  STUDY  GROUPS 
62  pages.    New  York,  1912. 


STORY-TELLING,   QUESTIONING 
AND  STUDYING 

THREE    SCHOOL  ARTS 


BT 


HEBMAN  HAREELL  HORNE,  Ph.D.  (Hakv.) 

PBOFE880B   OF   THE   HI8TORT   OF  EDCCATIOM 

A»D  THE  HISTORY  OF  PHILOSOPHY 

jrSW   TOBK   UKIVEB8ITT 


Neto  gork 

THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

1917 

All  rights  reserved 


■   A^ 


\f> 


$ 


ooptbight,  1916, 
Bt  the  MAOMILLAN  COMPAITT, 


Set  up  and  clectrotypcd.     Published  November,  1916. 
Reprinted  July,  1917. 


J.  8.  Gushing  Co.  —  Berwick  «fc  Smith  Co. 
Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


XCo 

JULIA,  BETSY,  BILLIE,  and  IDA 

WHO   LOVE   STORIES 

ASK  QUESTIONS,  AND  ARE  LEARNING 

HOW   TO   STUDY 


S«fiW5>« 


PREFACE 

In  1900  Colonel  Parker  spoke  before  the 
National  Education  Association  on  "Art  in 
Everything." 

Art  is  a  fundamental  need  of  life.  It  is  a 
mode  of  self-expression.  It  is  one  of  the  se- 
crets of  growth.  It  is  a  source  of  joy  in  work. 
It  takes  the  sting  out  of  drudgery.  It  makes 
something  sing  in  the  heart.  It,  and  not  money, 
is  that  by  which  the  souls  of  men  live;  by 
money  the  body  lives,  or  dies.  It  removes 
tedium  and  delays  fatigue.  Not  merely  to  en- 
joy works  of  art,  but  to  make  life  in  some  sense 
an  aesthetic  accomplishment  is  a  requisite  to 
complete  living. 

We  need  to  socialize  art.  We  have  allowed 
a  class  in  society  to  express  itself  in  art  forms 
and  to  joy  in  the  expression.  This  is  what  all 
members  of  society  should  do,  each  in  his  own 

7 


8  PREFACE 

way.  Social  conditions  will  in  time  be  changed 
to  allow  it. 

Each  type  of  artist  contributes  a  new  pleas- 
urable quality  to  life.  The  painter,  the  poet, 
the  musician,  the  sculptor,  the  architect,  the 
landscape  gardener,  the  actor,  the  dancer,  the 
story-teller,  —  each  in  his  own  way  increases 
the  sum  of  human  happiness. 

The  teacher,  too,  is  an  artist,  or  may  be.  His 
part  is  to  make  living  itself  complete,  beautiful. 
In  his  address  on  "The  Art  of  the  Teacher," 
given  when  United  States  Commissioner  of 
Education,  Chancellor  Brown  said,  "...  the 
fine  art  of  the  teacher  deals  with  real  things  on 
their  ideal  side." 

Every  child  is  an  artist.  The  teacher  opens 
the  door  to  aesthetic  enjoyment  and  expression 
for  the  child.  This  he  does  by  living  art  in  the 
presence  of  his  pupils.  His  methods  have  the 
sesthetic  stamp.  His  achieving  is  beautiful. 
Through  sesthetic  teachers  life  itself  will  in  time 
become  beautiful,  harmonious,  spontaneous, 
free,  organized.  Beauty  is  the  foe  of  injustice, 
evil,  error,  ugliness,  disease,  and  war. 


PREFACE  0 

As  teachers  we  need  to  awaken  to  the  fact 
that  life  in  the  making  is  in  our  hands.  If  we 
are  the  artificers  of  life  we  ought  to  be,  not 
again  after  one  generation  will  the  face  of  hu- 
manity be  marred.  Had  we  been  a  voice  and 
not  an  echo  for  the  past  generation,  the  present 
world-tragedy  could  not  have  been. 

Three  main  school  arts  are  story-telling, 
questioning,  and  studying.  Story-telling  be- 
longs in  the  upper  grades  and  in  the  high  school 
as  well  as  in  the  lower  grades  and  in  the  kinder- 
garten, where  it  is  domiciled  at  present.  Ques- 
tioning belongs  in  college  and  university,  if 
the  classes  are  fortunately  small  enough  in  size, 
as  well  as  in  secondary  and  elementary  schools, 
where  it  has  been  the  teacher's  staff  since  the 
days  of  printing.  Studying  aright  belongs  in 
the  lower  grades  and  even  in  the  kindergarten, 
for  young  children  have  to  face  their  little 
problems  and  try  to  solve  them,  as  well  as 
throughout  the  subsequent  stages  of  learning 
and  living.  In  fact,  these  three  are  universal 
school  arts.  They  are  a  part  of  the  technique 
of  all  teaching  as  a  craft. 


10  PREFACE 

Yet  these  arts  have  to  be  adapted  to  the  age 
of  the  pupil.  The  following  pages,  however, 
have  had  all  ages  in  mind.  Consequently  those 
who  read  for  practical  guidance  only  will  find  a 
few  pages  here  and  there  which  they  will  prefer 
to  omit.  Those  who  read  all,  for  the  sake  of 
the  subjects  themselves,  whether  they  be  ap- 
prentices, journeymen,  or  masters,  will  prob- 
ably find  nothing  unintelligible,  though  it  be 
unusable. 

May  these  and  other  arts  of  the  teacher  be 
so  well  done  that  teaching  becomes  in  a  measure 
a  fine  art  ?    Perhaps  so. 

The  content  of  these  studies  has  been  given 
in  lecture  form  from  time  to  time  in  the  Extra- 
Mural  courses  for  teachers  of  New  York  Uni- 
versity in  Brooklyn,  Newark,  and  Paterson,  and 
is  the  better  for  the  sympathetic  criticism  there- 
with accorded  them. 


H.  H.  H. 


Leonia,  N.J., 

December  30,  1915. 


ANALYTIC  TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  I 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING 


L    Introduction 

1.  Civilization  and  Story-Telling 

2.  Present-day  Revival  of  the  Story 

3.  Illustrations  of  Stories     . 


n.    Definition  op  the  Story 
in.    The  Form  of  the  Story 


rV.    The  Purpose  op  Story-Telling 
L  AsArt      . 
2.  Lincoln  as  a  Story-Teller 

V.    The  Importance  of  the  Story 

1.  The  Tool  of  Primitive  Man 

2.  The  Simplest  Vehicle  of  Truth 

3.  Adaptability  of  its  Form 

VI.    The  Characteristics  of  the  Good  Story 


Vn.    How  TO  Tell  a  Story     . 

1.  With  Personal  Magnetism 

2.  In  its  Setting    . 

3.  From  the  Child's  Standpoint 

4.  Imaginatively  . 
6.  Dramatically    . 

6.  Feelingly  .... 

7.  Self-forgetfully 

8.  With  Indirection 

11 


PAOB 
19 

19 
20 
22 

23 
26 
28 
28 
29 

31 
81 
34 
36 

37 
40 
40 
41 
41 
42 
42 
43 
43 
43 


12  ANALYTIC  TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

PAGK 

VIII.    The  Reactions  of  Children  on  Stories     .        .  45 

1.  Teaching  by  Expression 45 

2.  Re-telling  Stories 46 

3.  Illustrating  and  Dramatizing  ....  46 

IX.    The  Place  of  the  Story  in  Education      .        .  48 

X.  Final  Suggestions 49 

XI.  References 53 

1.  Where  to  Find  Stories 53 

2.  How  to  Tell  Stories 54 

3.  Lists  of  Graded  Stories 55 

XII.    Questions 60 

1.  On  the  Art  of  Story-Telling    ....  60 

2.  For  Further  Study 60 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING 
I.    Introduction     .... 
1.   Plato  on  Questioning 


2.  Outline  of  this  Chapter    ., 
n.    The  Importance  op  Questioning 

1.  A  Main  Mode  of  Teaching 

2.  The  Time  it  Consumes    . 

3.  An  Aid  in  Securing  Attention 

4.  An  Aid  in  Class  Management 
6.  Essential  to  Good  Teaching    . 

III.    The  General  Purposes  of  Questioning 

rv.    The  Kinds  of  Question  .... 

1.  The  Auxiliary  Question,  with  Illustrations 

2.  The   Searching  or  Heuristic  Question,  with 

Illustrations 

3.  The  Review  Question,  with  Illustrations 

4.  The  Examinational  Question,  with  Illustra- 

tions .... 


62 
62 
63 

64 
64 
64 
65 
65 
66 

67 
68 
68 

70 
74 

77 


ANALYTIC  TABLE  OF  CONTENTS  13 

PAOB 

V.    The  Manner  of  Questioning        ....  80 

1.  With  Sympathy 80 

2.  Question  before  Pupil 80 

3.  No  Predictable  Order  of  Pupils       ...  81 

4.  But  Little  Repetition 81 

5.  With  Deliberation .82 

6.  When  to  Ask  General  and  Specific  Questions  82 

VI.    The  Form  op  the  Question 84 

1.  Clearness 84 

2.  Brevity 85 

3.  Good  English 85 

4.  The  "  Yes  "  or  "  No  "  Answer  ....  86 

5.  No  "  Leading "  Question          ....  86 

Vll.    The  Content  of  the  Question     ....  87 

1.  Stimulating 88 

2.  Definite 88 

3.  Essential .        .  89 

4.  Logical 90 

5.  Thought-provoking 90 

6.  Suited  to  Individual  Capacity          ...  91 

Vin.    The  Questioner 91 

1.  Prepare  in  Advance 91 

2.  Analytic 92 

3.  Practical 92 

4.  Elicit  the  Best 93 

5.  Be  Ready  to  Answer 94 

6.  Self-critical 96 

7.  Study  the  Literature 97 

IX.    The  Answer 97 

1.  The  Pupil's  Reaction 98 

2.  Good  Language 98 

,              8.  Correctness 98 

4.   Oral  and  Written  Answers      ....  99 

6.   How  to  Treat  the  Incorrect  Answer        .        .  99 

6.  Answers  to  be  Discouraged      ....  100 

7.  Examples  of  Natural  Humor  in  Answers        .  101 


14 


ANALYTIC  TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 


XI. 

XII. 

XIII. 


PA.OK 

Great  Questioners 103 

1.  Socrates 103 

2.  Jesus 107 

3.  Dr.  Mark  Hopkins Ill 

4.  The  Skilful  Lawyer Ill 

The  Larger  Questions 114 

References  ok  the  Art  of  Questioning    .        .  114 

Questions 115 

1.  On  the  Art  of  Questioning      .        .        .        .  115 

2.  For  Further  Study 116 


CHAPTER  in 


n. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING 
Introduction 

1.  The  New  Interest  in  this  Subject 

2.  Present-day  Waste  in  Education 

Definition  of  Study 

1.  Too  Narrow  a  Definition 

2.  Statement  of  the  Definition     . 


nL    General  Presuppositions  of  Study 

1.  The  Life  of  Study    . 

2.  Many  Interests 

3.  Independence  . 

4.  The  Love  of  Truth  . 

5.  The  Habit  of  Study 

6.  The  Ideal  of  Study  . 

IV.    Mechanical  Aids  to  Study 
V.    Physical  Conditions  of  Study 
VI.    How  to  Study  .... 

1.  Three  Related  Questions 

2.  The  Herbartian  Formula 


118 
118 
119 

120 
120 
121 

122 
122 
123 
124 
125 
127 
128 

129 
131 
134 
134 
134 


ANALYTIC  TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 


15 


5. 


Four  Phases  of  the  Study  Process 
How  Shall  I  Study? 

(1)  The  Problem     . 

(2)  The  Hunt . 

(3)  The  Solution     . 

(4)  Its  Use       . 
Comparison  with  McMurry's  List 


VIL    How  TO  Study  a  Text 

1.  Definition  of  Need 

2.  Analysis   . 

3.  Synthesis  . 

4.  Application 


2. 


4. 


Vni.    Training  Pupils  to  Study 

1.   DiflBculties  in  Learning  to  Study 

At  What  Age  Should  Such  Training  Begin 
"When  and  Where  Shall  the  Child  Study? " 
How  the  Training  Should  be  Done 
(1)  Study  with  the  Pupils 

Sensing  the  Problem 

Hunting  for  the  Solution 

Recognizing  the  Solution 

Using  the  Solution    . 

Enlist  the  Aid  of  Parents 


(2) 
(3) 
(4) 
(5) 
(6) 


IX.    Influence  of  Good  Teaching  on  Studying 

1.  Various    Methods    Repeat   the    Factors    in 

Study         

2.  Use  of  the  Psychology  of  Learning 

3.  Right  Attitude  toward  Texts  . 
Variety  of  Presentation   .... 
Right  Examinations         .... 
Place  Responsibility  on  Pupils 
The  Teacher  must  be  a  Student 
Consequent    Principles    of     Teaching    and 

Studying 


X.    The  Five  Results  of  Study 


16         ANALYTIC  TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

PAaa 

XI.    Three  Problems  Related  to  the  Art  of  Study  167 

1.  Mastering  a  New  Book    .        .        .        .        .  167 

2.  Making  Notes 169 

3.  Writing  a  Paper 169 

XII.    Guiding  the  Study  Process 171 

Xin.    References  on  the  Art  of  Study        .        ,        .  174 

XrV.    Questions 175 

1.  On  the  Art  of  Studying 175 

2.  For  Further  Study 176 


STORY-TELLING,  QUESTIONING 
AND  STUDYING 


STORY-TELLING,  QUESTIONING, 
AND  STUDYING 

CHAPTER  I 
THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING 

Civilization  is  hard  on  story -telling  as  on  the 
other  simple  arts  of  primitive  man.  The  trans- 
mission  of  culture   by   oral   tradition 

Civilization 

has  been  supplanted  by  the  printed  and  story- 
page.  The  exactions  of  modern  busi- 
ness leave  little  time  and  less  inclination  to 
the  father  to  regale  the  souls  of  his  children 
with  tales  told  him  when  he  was  a  boy,  or 
even  of  the  happenings  of  his  own  boyhood. 
The  club-life  in  cities  often  separates  father,  and 
sometimes  even  the  mother,  from  the  children 
at  the  bedtime  hour.  The  cellar  furnace  and 
the  gas  log  are  the  poor  substitutes  of  modern 
life  for  the  old  open  fireplace.  The  result  is 
that  story-telling  as  an  art  is  in  danger  of  vanish- 

19 


20     :  THREE   SCHOOL  ARTS 

ing  from  our  modern  life,  and  with  it  much  of 
the  joy  and  culture  of  the  olden  time. 

Yet  it  is  still  true  that  the  hearts  of  children 

hunger  for  fairyland  and  their  souls  thirst  for 

the  elemental  racial   happenings,  and 

The 

Revival  of  amply  rewarded  are  the  parents  and 
teachers  who  satisfy  them.  The  re- 
vival of  story-telling  will  contribute  something 
toward  keeping  young  and  fresh  a  nervous  and 
fatigued  civilization.  In  the  older  simpler  coun- 
tries the  story  as  a  medium  of  instruction  and 
entertainment  still  survives,  as  in  India,  Ara- 
bia, Persia,  Norway,  and  South  America.  It  is 
not  a  fatuous  delusion  to  suppose  that  a  cus- 
tom so  nourishing  to  the  human  soul,  and 
yet  so  endangered  by  our  mode  of  life,  may  be 
preserved  by  diligent  effort. 

So  at  least  think  the  members  of  the  Story- 
Tellers'  League,^  and  so  think  the  kindergart- 
ners.  The  disciples  of  Froebel  have  helped  save 
the  story  to  our  generation.  The  Boy  Scout 
movement  with  its    camp-fire  and    tales    may 

^  For  information  address  R.  T.  Wyche,  Everett  House,  New  York, 
or  The  Story  Hour,  3320  Nineteenth  St..  N.  W.,  Washington,  D.C.,  or 
The  Story-Teller's  Magazine  27  W.  23d  St.,  N.  Y.  City. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  21 

also  be  expected  to  help  perpetuate  the  story. 

Thompson  Seton  makes  his  hearers  feel  the  magic 

of  the  camp-fire,  and  concerning  the  open  fire 

John  Burroughs  has  written  : 

The  open  fire  is  a  primitive,  elemental  thing.  It  cheers 
with  more  than  mere  heat;  it  is  a  bit  of  the  red  heart 
of  nature  laid  bare ;  it  is  a  dragon  of  the  prince  docile  and 
friendly  there  in  the  corner.  What  pictures,  what  ac- 
tivity, how  social,  how  it  keeps  up  the  talk !  You  are 
not  permitted  to  forget  it  for  a  moment.  How  it  responds 
when  you  nudge  it!  How  it  rejoices  when  you  feed  it! 
Why,  an  open  fire  in  your  room  is  a  whole  literature.  It 
supplements  your  library  as  nothing  else  in  the  room  does 
or  can. 

Both  the  public  libraries  and  the  playground 
associations  are  also  helping  to  revive  the  art 
of  story-telling  in  our  day.  The  quantity  of 
the  new  literature  on  this  subject  is  surprisingly 
large.  So  long  as  society  preserves  the  child- 
hood of  the  children,  the  fascination  of  '*Once 
upon  a  time"  will  remain,  and  it  will  be  an 
ominous  day  for  society  when,  through  either 
haste  or  neglect,  its  children  are  not  allowed 
to  revel  in  the  world's  imaginings.  Premature 
senility  is  the  effect  of  an  undeveloped  imagi- 
nation in  child  or  nation. 


%%  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

We  may  approach  our  subject  by  naming 

certain  illustrations  of  stories  that  will  naturally 

be  in  the  minds  of  story-tellers.     The 

Illustra- 
tions of       primitive  life  of  the  Indian  is  portrayed 

in  the  epic  Hiawatha.  The  animal 
world  as  envisaged  by  the  negro  imagination 
is  presented  in  Uncle  Remus.  The  early  Saxon 
life  is  embodied  in  the  grand  epic  of  Beowulf. 
The  marvellous  prehistoric  civilization  of  Greece 
appears  in  Homer.  The  exuberant  Oriental 
imagination  has  fashioned  for  the  world's  chil- 
dren the  Arabian  Nights.  For  moral  direct- 
ness the  Hebrew  stories  preserved  in  the  Old 
Testament,  likewise  Oriental,  are  incompar- 
able. Then  there  are  the  cosmogonies  of  prim- 
itive peoples,  as  in  Hesiod,  the  mythologies  of 
Greece,  and  the  Norse  sagas.  The  fables  of 
iEsop,  despite  the  Ikbc  fahula  docety  satisfy  a 
boy's  mind  at  a  certain  age,  as  many  adults  can 
testify.  La  Fontaine  is  a  good  second  to 
iEsop.  The  Middle  Ages,  welding  new  peoples 
with  an  older  civilization,  produced  the  Span- 
ish Cid,  the  French  Chanson  de  Roland,  the 
German    Niebelungen,    and    the    British    King 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  23 

Arthur.  The  term  "story"  is  so  comprehen- 
sive that  even  ordinary  illustrations,  examples, 
incidents,  and  happenings  may  be  used  for 
the  purposes  of  story-telling,  though  they  neces- 
sarily lack  the  racial  flavor  so  essential  for  best 
results. 

If  we  search  through  the  preceding  illustra- 
tions with  a  view  to  finding  the  genus  of  liter- 
ature to  which  they  belong  and  the 

,     .  .      .  Definition 

marks  distmguishmg  the  story  from  of  the 
other  species  of  the  same  genus,  as  the 
logic  of  definition  requires  us  to  do,  we  may 
agree  to  define  the  story  as  a  free  narration^ 
not  necessarily  factual  but  truthful  in  character. 
The  story  is  not  history,  though  there  may  be 
historical  stories,  but  it  is  an  imaginative  inven- 
tion. The  terms  "story"  and  "history"  are 
indeed  derived  from  the  same  root,  meaning 
inquiry  and  what  is  learned  thereby,  but  for 
us  history  tells  us  what  happened  at  a  definite 
place  and  time,  while  the  story  tells  us  only 
what  might  have  happened  at  some  indefinite 
place  and  time.  What  Aristotle  said  of  poetry 
in  comparison  with  history  is  also  true  of  the 


24  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

story,  —  poetry,  he  said,  is  truer  than  history. 
This  paradox  is  resolvable  if  we  compare  the 
poetry  of  Homer  with  the  history  of  Herodotus ; 
the  one  is  universal,  the  other  is  local.  The 
story  gives  us  human  nature  in  its  bold  out- 
lines; history,  in  its  individual  details.  Simi- 
larly Canon  Cheyne  has  remarked  in  compar- 
ing the  Psalms  with  the  Acts:  "Good  as  the 
truth  of  history  may  be,  the  truth  of  poetry 
may  for  purposes  of  edification  be  even  better." 
Truth  is  stranger  than  good  fiction  just  because 
the  fiction  is  bound  by  the  traits  of  universal 
human  nature,  whereas  truth  is  bound  only  by 
the  individual  facts  which  vary  widely  from 
the  general  average.  Nothing  in  all  Tolstoi's 
novels,  highly  imaginative  as  they  are,  is  quite 
so  strange  as  his  own  actual  exit  from  this 
world.  The  story  as  a  narrative  is  free,  be- 
cause it  is  not  bound  by  spatial  and  temporal 
details,  as  is  history,  but  the  story  is  truthful 
in  character  because  it  portrays  human  nature 
as  it  is  generally.  We  are  not  concerned  with 
the  country  in  which  "Cinderella"  lived  or  the 
year  in  which  the  "Ugly  Duckling"  was  born. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  25 

The  distinction  which  the  definition  makes 
between  the  factual  and  the  imaginative  is 
emphasized  because  the  child's  mind  at  about 
six  years  of  age  begins  to  make  the  same  dis- 
tinction. Those  telling  stories  to  young  chil- 
dren will  often  have  had  the  question  put  to 
them  by  the  inquiring  mind  of  some  child : 
'*Did  it  really  happen?"  In  answering  this 
question  it  is  very  important  not  to  label  the 
the  story  as  history.  When  the  child's  mind 
has  distinguished  between  fancy  and  fact,  it  is 
time  for  parent  and  teacher  to  do  the  same.  To 
say  frankly:  **It  is  only  a  story"  will,  on  the 
one  hand,  not  detract  much  from  the  child's 
pleasure  in  it,  while,  at  the  same  time,  it  helps 
him  realize  his  real  world ;  besides,  it  will  later 
prevent  the  process  of  undermining  his  faith, 
sure  to  follow  upon  the  early  blind  acceptance 
of  the  story  as  literally  true.  Follow  nature's 
leading  in  making  the  transition  from  child- 
hood's natural  credulity  to  manhood's  natural 
criticism.  A  fond  father  said  to  his  little  girl : 
"Come  here  and  let  me  tell  you  how  God  made 
the  world."     She  said,  with  open  eyes,  "Papa, 


26  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

do  you  know?"  "I  know  a  story  that  tells," 
was  the  satisfying  answer.  When  children  are 
disappointed  that  the  story  is  not  really  true, 
they  may  be  told  realistic,  factual,  historic 
narratives  instead. 

Closely    associated    with    the    definition    of 
the  story  is  the  account  of  its  form.     Inde- 
pendent   of    the    content    which    the 
TheFonn  .  i        i  .  i 

of  the  story    carries,   and    which    may   vary 

from  history  to  nonsense,  is  the  form 
of  the  story  which  is  practically  the  same  in 
all  stories.  The  content  is  varied  and  par- 
ticular, the  form  is  the  same  and  universal. 
Now  there  are  four  main  elements  in  the  form 
of  each  story,  viz.  the  beginning,  the  develop- 
ment, the  climax,  and  the  end.  In  this  re- 
spect the  story  is  very  much  like  the  drama 
with  its  four  or  five  acts,  first  setting  forth  the 
characters,  then  unwinding  the  plot,  then  the 
climax,  and  finally  the  results.  As  Professor 
St.  John  ^  expresses  it:  "To  summarize,  every 
good  story  must  have  a  beginning  that  rouses 
interest,  a  succession  of  events  that  is  orderly 

1 E.  P.  St.  John.  Stories  and  Story-Telling,  p.  13.  Boston,  1910. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  27 

and  complete,  a  climax  that  forms  the  story's 
point,  and  an  end  that  leaves  the  mind  at  rest." 
To  fix  these  four  features  of  the  story's  form 
in  mind  will  help  us  understand  the  nature  of 
the  story,  will  help  us  also  to  remember  it  and 
to  tell  it  again.  It  is  better  not  to  memorize 
the  words  of  a  story,  leaving  something  to 
spontaneity  in  the  telling,  but  the  framework  of 
the  story  we  are  to  tell  should  be  in  mind. 

For  example,  in  Hawthorne's  story:  ''The 
Great  Stone  Face,"  the  beginning  acquaints 
us  with  the  Great  Stone  Face,  Ernest,  his 
mother,  and  the  prophecy;  the  development 
brings  before  us  Gathergold,  Old  Blood-and- 
Thunder,  and  Old  Stony  Phiz,  as  well  as  the 
poet;  the  climax  is  reached  in  the  exclamation 
of  the  poet:  "Behold!  Behold!  Ernest  is  him- 
self the  likeness  of  the  Great  Stone  Face"; 
and  the  end  shows  us  the  effect  on  Ernest  of 
the  recognition.  The  four  elements  in  the  form 
of  the  story  can  be  similarly  found  in  other 
familiar  stories. 

It  follows  from  the  definition  of  the  story 
that  its  purpose  is  not  primarily  to  give  infor- 


28  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

mation,  but  to  nurture  the  soul;  that  is,  to 
expand  the  imagination,  to  widen  the  sym- 
ThePur-  pathies,  to  give  pure  pleasure.  The 
story-  story  is  the  child's  vicarious  experi- 
teiiing  gj^^g  ^f  reality,  that  is,  it  is  an  im- 
aginative substitute  for  real  experience.  The 
story  as  an  art  form  of  literature  is  a  thing  of 
beauty  primarily.  It  should  be  told  for  the 
joy  it  gives  to  the  narrator  and  the  listener. 
Whatever  information  it  carries,  even  what- 
ever conduct  it  prompts,  are  incidental,  though 
important,  accompaniments  of  the  story  as  told. 
Tell  the  story  well  and  it  will  unlock  to  you  the 
child's  heart  and,  by  nurturing  his  soul,  it  will 
prepare  him  to  understand  and  enjoy  all  litera- 
ture as  an  exposition  of  life.  Many  subjects  in 
our  curriculum  as  taught  repress  individuality 
and  personality;  the  story  cultivates  both. 

Professor  St.  John  ^  distinguishes  seven  aims 
in  story-telling,  as  follows :  to  entertain,  to 
guide  reading,  for  language-study,  for  intel- 
lectual discipline,  for  ^  illustration,  for  aesthetic 
culture,  and  for  cfiaracter-formation. 

1 E.  P.  St.  John,  Stories  and  Story-Telling,  Chap.  XI. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  29 

These  seven  are  all  phases  of  the  one  great 
aim  of  soul-development.  In  the  words  of  the 
great  modern  inspirer  of  story-tellers,  Froebel: 
"Ear  and  heart  open  to  the  genuine  story- 
teller, as  the  blossoms  open  to  the  sun  of  spring 
and  to  the  vernal  rain.  Mind  breathes  mind; 
power  feels  power,  and  absorbs  it,  as  it  were. 
The  telling  of  stories  refreshes  the  mind  as  a 
bath  refreshes  the  body ;  it  gives  exercise  to 
the  intellect  and  its  powers ;  it  tests  the  judg- 
ment and  the  feelings."^  It  is  characteristic  of 
Froebel  to  use  such  expressions  as  "mind 
breathes  mind,  power  feels  power";  they  seem 
vague,  but  the  real  story-teller  knows  there  is 
a  meaning  in  the  words. 

Lincoln  illustrates  the  more  practical  uses 
to  which  story-telling  may  be  put.  Richard 
Watson   Gilder  ^  presents  this  side  of 

Lincoln  as 

the     great     story-teller     as     follows :  a  story- 
teller 
"Colonel  Burt  reports  a  strange  in- 
terview with  Lincoln  at  the  Soldiers'  Home  at 
a  time   of  keen   anxiety   and   when   a  person 

»  Froebel,  Education  of  Man,  p.  307  (Hailman  Tr.)»  N.  Y.,  1900, 
«  "Lincoln  the  Leader,"  Century,  Feb.,  1909. 


\ 


30  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

present  had  rudely  demanded  one  of  his  'good 
stories.'  'I  beUeve/  said  Lincoln,  turning 
away  from  the  challenger,  'I  have  the  popular 
reputation  of  being  a  story-teller,  but  I  do  not 
deserve  the  name  in  its  general  sense ;  for  it  is 
not  the  story  itself,  but  its  purpose,  or  effect, 
that  interests  me.  I  often  avoid  a  long  and 
useless  discussion  by  others  or  a  laborious 
explanation  on  my  own  part  by  a  short  story 
that  illustrates  my  point  of  view.  So,  too,  the 
sharpness  of  a  refusal,  or  the  edge  of  a  rebuke, 
may  be  blunted  by  an  appropriate  story,  so 
as  to  save  wounded  feeling  and  yet  serve  the 
purpose.  No,  I  am  not  simply  a  story-teller, 
but  story-telling  as  an  emollient  saves  me  much 
friction  and  distress.' "  Many  another  leader 
of  men  has  found  with  Lincoln  the  great  value 
of  the  story  "as  an  emollient,"  especially  if  it 
be  of  the  humorous  type.  To  end  an  unsatis- 
factory conference  with  a  pleasantry  is  to  rise 
above  it.  This  characteristic  use  of  the  story 
made  by  Lincoln  may  be  illustrated  by  the 
following  from  Major  W.  S.  Hubbell,  famous 
as  a  teller  of  civil  war  tales  : 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  81 

Lincoln  one  day  was  visited  by  three  men  with  a  new 
gun  device.  Lincoln  sent  them  to  Secretary  Stanton, 
who  sent  them  back  to  Lincoln,  who  then  sent  them  to  a 
Congressional  committee.  After  pursuing  the  Presi- 
dent for  some  time,  Lincoln  finally  stopped  them  before 
they  began  to  speak  of  their  invention.  He  had  them  sit 
down  and  then  said : 

"Let  me  tell  you  a  story.  This  story  is  about  a  little 
boy  who  had  to  memorize  the  story  in  the  Bible  about  the 
three  men  in  the  fiery  furnace.  He  could  not  remember 
their  names  and  got  a  last  chance  under  a  threat.  The 
boy  began  well,  but  when  he  came  to  the  three  hard 
names,  broke  down  and  cried:  *  There  come  those  three 
old  bores  again.*"  Lincoln  finished  the  story  there,  and 
looked  smilingly  at  the  three  inventors. 

The  importance  of  the  story  as  an  educa- 
tional instrument  arises  from  three  consider- 
ations, viz.  its   having   been  the  tool 

Thelmpor- 

of  primitive  man,  its"^  being  the  sim-  tanceof 

the  story 

plest  vehicle  of  truth,  and  its  being 
so  flexible  a  Hterary  form. 

The  story  is  primitive  man's  tool  for  trans- 
mitting his  reactions  upon  his  world.  The 
first   history   and   the   first   literature 

The  Tool 

are  stories.     "It  [History]  was  doubt-  ofPrimi- 

less  discovered  in  the  first  instance  by 

the  story-teller,   and   its  purpose   has   usually 


32  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

been  to  tell  a  tale  rather  than  to  contribute  to 
a  well-considered  body  of  scientific  knowl- 
edge." ^  Such  primitive  transmission  is  oral, 
all  unessential  details  drop  off  in  the  process 
\of  repetition  generation  after  generation.  The 
world  of  primitive  man  is  partly  natural  and 
partly  human,  and  so  his  stories  include  both 
myths  and  legends.  The  myth  is  his  reac- 
tion upon  the  natural  world  and  legend  his 
reaction  upon  the  human  world,  especially  the 
past  of  his  own  tribe  or  people.  An  illustra- 
tion of  the  story  as  the  tool  of  primitive  man 
we  see  in  the  following  quotation  from  one  who 
knows  by  experience. 

"Very  early,  the  Indian  boy  assumed  the 
task  of  preserving  and  transmitting  the  legends 
of  his  ancestors  and  race.  Almost  every  eve- 
ning a  myth,  or  a  true  story  of  some  deed  done 
in  the  past,  was  narrated  by  one  of  the  parents 
or  grandparents,  while  the  boy  listened  with 
parted  lips  and  glistening  eyes.  On  the  fol- 
lowing evening,  he  was  usually  required  to 
repeat  it.     If  he  was  not  an  apt  scholar,  he 

1  J.  H.  Robinson,  The  New  History,  p.  27,  N.  Y.,  1912. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  SS 

struggled  long  with  his  task ;  but,  as  a  rule,  the 
Indian  boy  is  a  good  listener  and  has  a  good 
memory,  so  that  the  stories  were  tolerably  well 
mastered.  The  household  became  his  audi- 
ence, by  which  he  was  alternately  criticized  and 
applauded."^ 

We  must  not  thoughtlessly  identify  present 
savages  with  primitive  man,  yet  present  sav- 
ages do  provide  us  with  many  concrete  illus- 
trations of  what  we  know  to  be  true  of  primi- 
tive man.  Thus  an  African  missionary  writes 
of  his  experiences  in  a  native  village :  *' We  will 
now  ask  the  king  for  some  stories,  and  you 
will  find  that  he  has  an  abundance  of  them. 
The  Bulu  have  a  wealth  of  spoken  literature, 
rich  in  fables  and  fairy  tales.  They  love  them 
and  will  take  delight  in  relating  them  to 
you  by  the  hour,  if  you  have  time  to  listen. 
Even  the  little  children  are  well  versed  in 
these.  They  have  their  own  story  of  the  cre- 
ation and  fall  of  man,  of  the  good  and  bad 
hereafter,  all  of  which  are  intensely  odd  and 
interesting." 

»  C.  A.  Eaatman.  Indian  Boyhood,  p.  51,  N.  Y.,  1902. 
o 


S4  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

The  fact  that  the  story  is  the  product  of 
primitive  man  explains  in  part  why  the  chil- 
dren hunger  so  for  the  story  and  find  their 
keenest  satisfaction  in  the  racial  stories.  The 
modern  child  individual  is  calling  for  the  soul- 
food  of  the  ancient  child  race  of  primitive  men. 
To  deny  them  this  pabulum  is  to  dwarf  the 
soul-stature  and  to  induce  premature  maturity. 

Second,  we  said  the  story  is  important  be- 
cause it  is  the  simplest  vehicle  of  instruction 
The  Sim-  ^^^  undeveloped  and  untutored  minds. 
Vehicle  of  ^^  ^^^  ^^^  modcs  of  Comprehension 
Truth  Qf  minds  just  feeling  their  powers  as 

nothing  else  does,  making  little  draft  upon  the 
abstract  and  intellectual  functions  of  mind. 
The  story  is  an  arrow  feathered  with  truth 
finding  its  way  easily  to  its  target. 

In  speaking  on  "The  Place  of  Formal  In- 
struction    in     Religious     and     Moral 

President 

HaU  Education"  President  Hall^  said  con- 

quoted 

cerning  the  story : 

"Formal  moral  and  religious  instruction  at  home 
should,  of  course,  begin  with  stories,  very  simple,  brief, 

1  G.  Stanley  Hall,  Proc.  R.  E.  A.,  1905,  pp.  69-70. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  35 

and  oft-repeated  at  first,  and  rapidly  increasing  in  num- 
ber, kind  and  complexity,  as  the  child's  intelligence 
expands.  Stories  are  the  oldest  form  of  transmitted  cul- 
tm-e  and  the  most  formative.  All  should  have  a  moral 
more  and  more  disguised  and  implicit  as  the  child  ad- 
vances in  years,  but  the  moral  should  be  ever  present 
for  sentiments,  will,  or  both.  I  suspect  and  challenge 
the  word  'formal'  in  my  topic  if  it  involves,  as  it  does 
with  too  many  pedagogues,  anything  methodic.  It 
should  at  first  be  as  free  as  possible  from  every  element  of 
didacticism,  systematic  sequence,  or  the  drill  factors  of 
the  precisian.  Form  should  be  utterly  subordinate  to 
content,  and  the  tales  should  be  of  the  greatest  possible 
number  and  variety.  Young  children  need  elemental 
story-roots,  picturing  all  the  elemental  good  and  evil  in  the 
world ;  all  these,  of  which  the  kindergarten  has  a  very  pre- 
cious kit,  though  far  too  few,  too  elaborated,  and  selected 
from  too  narrow  a  range,  the  child  needs,  and  for  these  its 
moral  appetite  is  voracious.  Every  mother  should  be  a 
story-teller  and  her  repertory  should  be  large,  well-chosen, 
and  ever  replenished,  and  the  father  should  take  his 
turn.  What  else  was  the  twilight  hour,  and  the  fire- 
place (where  that  still  survives !)  made  for  ?  Tales  are 
the  natural  soul-food  of  children,  their  native  breath 
and  vital  air;  but  our  children  are  too  often  story- 
starved  or  charged  with  ill-chosen  or  ill-adapted  twaddle 
tales.  Good  tales,  well  told,  preform  the  moral  choices 
of  adult  life  aright.  Many  Bible  stories  are  among  the 
best,  but  these  are  not  enough  and  there  are  not  enough 
adapted  to  any  age,  so  we  should  go  outside,  and  draw 
on  other  sources. 


36  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

Third,  the  importance  of  the  story  is  made 
manifest  in  that  as  a  literary  form  it  lends 
TheAdap-  itself  to  any  content.  The  story  is  not 
the^stor^'s  history,  but  there  may  be  historic 
^°"^  stories;   the  story  is  not  science,  but 

there  may  be  scientific  stories;  the  story  is 
not  ethics,  but  there  may  be  moral  stories. 
When  history,  science,  and  ethics  drop  their 
generalizations,  become  concrete,  appeal  to 
the  imagination  and  to  the  feelings,  exciting 
admiration  or  censure,  and  prompting  changes 
in  conduct,  they  become  stories.  What  his- 
tory becomes  as  story  Plutarch  can  show; 
what  science  becomes  as  story  modern  animal 
stories  illustrate,  e.g.,  those  of  Thompson  Seton ; 
and  what  ethics  becomes  as  story  iEsop  and 
La  Fontaine  witness.  By  adopting  this  form 
history,  science,  and  ethics  lose  nothing  for 
the  child,  though  they  do  for  the  adult,  and  gain 
much  for  all.  For  further  illustrations  of  the 
use  of  the  story  in  historic  and  moral  instruc- 
tion, see  the  references  to  the  works  of  Miss 
Gowdy  and  Mr.  Gould  respectively  at  the  end 
of  this  chapter.     In  view  of  the  significance  of 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  37 

the  story  to  the  primitive  mind  of  the  race  and 
of  the  child,  of  its  truth-carrying  power,  and 
of  the  flexibiHty  of  its  Hterary  form,  we  reahze 
the  importance  of  the  story ;  and  in  view  of  the 
importance  of  the  story,  should  we  fail  as  parents 
and  teachers  and  friends  of  children  to  culti- 
vate the  story-teller's  art? 

The  good  story  is  the  one  that  appeals  to  the 
unperyerted  taste  of  children.  Even  the  stories 
that  appeal  to  perverted  tastes,  such  character- 
as  the  dime-novel  hero  and  the  mawk-  q^q^^^  ^^ 
ishly  sentimental  heroine,  have  some  ^*°^ 
good  qualities.  What  are  the  characteristics 
that  make  a  story  go  ?  Miss  Bryant  ^  finds 
them  to  be  three,  —  "action,  in  close  sequence ; 
f^iliar  images  tinged  with  mystery;  some 
degree  of  repetition."  St.  John  ^  also  empha- 
sizes the  quality  of  action  in  a  good  story,  and 
adds  two  other  characteristics :  suggestiveness 
and  unity.  Haslett  ^  also  mentions  action, 
suggestiveness,  and  unity,  as  well  as  a  number 


» S.  C.  Bryant,  How  to  Tell  Stories  to  Children,  p.  48. 
*  E.  P.  St.  John,  Stories  and  Story-Telling,  Chap.  V. 
'  S.  B.  Haslett,  Pedagogical  Bible  School,  pp.  244-245. 


38  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

of  other  characteristics,  such  as  plot,  narra- 
tive, richness  of  material,  adherence  to  original, 
moral  and  character  elements,  and  emotional 
coloring. 

Mr.  Chesterton^  has  shown  us  the  impor- 
tance of  "adherence  to  original."  Through 
lack  of  such  adherence,  Milton,  Goethe,  and 
Wagner  are  guilty,  he  thinks,  of  spoiling  good 
stories.  Of  Milton's  "Paradise  Lost"  he  says, 
"The  story,  as  it  stands  in  the  Bible,  is  infi- 
nitely more  sublime  and  delicate."  Of  Goethe's 
Faust  he  says:  "The  old  Faust  is  damned  for 
doing  a  great  sin;  but  the  new  Faust  is  saved 
for  doing  a  small  sin  —  a  mean  sin."  Likewise 
the  old  story  makes  Tannhauser  go  away  in 
despair  of  being  pardoned,  while  Wagner  makes 
him  return  repentant  a  second  time.  "If 
that  is  not  spoiling  a  story,  I  do  not  know  what 
is."  The  point  is  that  the  old  stories  represent 
a  simplicity  and  directness  of  moral  quality 
which  is  softened  into  weakness  in  the  later 
modifications.  The  originals  represent  racial 
experiences,   the   unfaithful   copies   show  indi- 

*  Quoted  in  Literary  Digest,  "  Spoiling  Good  Stories,"  April  16,  1910. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  39 

vidual  opinions.  Not  that  the  story-teller 
should  memorize  the  words  of  the  original, 
but  that  he  should  retain  its  main  qualities. 
The  racial  stories  orally  transmitted  for  gen- 
erations are  best  just  because  they  have  lost 
in  the  process  all  that  is  not  typical. 

In  addition  to  all  the  many  qualities  above 
indicated,  we  may  note  that  good  stories  are 
very  human,  very  concrete,  very  intelligible, 
and  universal  in  their  appeal.  Human,  be- 
cause they  are  racial  products;  concrete,  be- 
cause the  primitive  mind  did  not  express  itself 
abstractly;  intelligible,  because  of  the  elemen- 
tary ideas  conveyed  and  feelings  aroused; 
and  universal  in  their  appeal  because  adults 
are  children  grown  up  without  having  lost 
entirely  their  ancestral  inheritance.  The  four- 
page  story  of  Dickens,  "A  Child's  Dream  of  a 
Star,"  reveals  several  of  these  characteristics, 
such  as  quick  action,  the  suggestion  of  the 
mysterious  about  the  familiar,  repetition,  unity, 
plot,  nah-ative,  emotional  coloring,  character 
elements,  concreteness,  intelligibility,  and  uni- 
versal appeal.      Some  of   these  traits  can   be 


40  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

found  in  all  the  stories  that  children  espe- 
cially like. 

Story-telling  is  an  art,  a  fine  art.  As  in  the 
case  of  other  arts,  the  gift  for  story-telling 
HowtoTeU  niust  be  inborn,  but  in  addition  the 
a  story  gj£|.  j.gq^}j,gs  cultivation.  We  can  dis- 
pense neither  with  heredity  nor  with  train- 
ing. But  in  giving  directions  for  training 
ourselves  in  this  art,  we  must  limit  ourselves 
to  general  principles  of  guidance,  omitting  too 
specific  and  detailed  formulas,  which  would 
imduly  cramp  the  personality  of  the  story-teller 
and  so  tend  to  a  mechanical  procedure. 

First  of  all,  then,  the  personality  of  the  story- 
teller must  shine  through  the  story,  through  its 
selection,  its  narration,  and  its  appre- 

WithPer-       ,      ,  J  -ri- 

sonaiMag-  ciation.  Tell  the  story  with  all  the 
netism 

personal  magnetism  you  can  muster. 

Weave  the  spell  of  the  story-teller's  art.  "Once 
upon  a  time"  is  itself  the  magical  "Open 
Sesame"  to  the  imagination  and  interest  of 
the  children. 

If  the  story  has  a  setting,  get  it  in  your  im- 
agination before  beginning.     It  will  help  your 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  41 

own  appreciation  of  the  story  and  your  appreci- 
ation will  pass  on  by  contagion  to  the  children. 
The  setting  of  the  story  is  like  the  jj^.^^ 
frame  to  the  picture,  setting  it  off.  letting 
The  setting  for  Jotham's  parable  of  the  trees 
is  the  transition  in  Israel  from  a  theocracy  to 
a  monarchy.  The  setting  for  Jesus  blessing 
little  children  is  the  dusty  roadside  with  the 
Master  busy  teaching  and  healing  and  the 
devoted  disciples  anxious  to  make  his  work  as 
easy  for  him  as  possible.  The  story  should 
not  be  prefaced  formally  with  the  setting,  but 
the  setting  should  be  in  the  mind  of  the  story- 
teller and  may  be  informally  introduced  as  the 
narration  proceeds. 

Take  the  point  of  view  of  the  children  as 
you  tell  the  story.  Tell  it  in  fact  as  a  child 
would  tell  it,  with  improvements.     In 

^  From  the 

order  to  do  this,  you  must  study  the  ChUd's 

1-11  n  1  1     •       •  standpoint 

stones  children  tell,  and  see  their  sim- 
plicity, directness,  and  swiftly  moving  action. 
You  must  also  like  children  and  understand 
them.     The    teacher    can    more    easily    adapt 
himself  to  the  child's  standard  of  language  and 


42  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

understanding  than  the  child  can  rise  to  the 
teacher's  standard.  H.  T.  Mark  says  the 
hunger  of  the  soul  is  the  philosophy  of  child- 
hood ;  if  so,  the  story  is  the  suitable  nutrition. 
Think  the  story  as  you  tell  it,  even  if  you 
know   it  perfectly.     The  phonograph   can  re- 

1  imagi-  produce  a  story  but  it  cannot  think 
natively  j|.  'pj^^  events  must  be  imagined 
vividly  as  they  are  narrated ;  they  must  be 
seen  and  heard  again.  Children  think  in  pic- 
tures and  the  story-teller  must  do  the  same  to 
facilitate  the  passage  of  the  story  from  mind  to 
mind. 

Act  the  story  too,  by  suggestion,  as  you  tell 
it;     by    suggestion,    not    by    imitation.     The 

2  Dra-  movements  of  animals  may  be  sug- 
maticaUy  gested  by  gestures,  to  imitate  them 
would  spoil  the  story  and  suggest  a  game. 
The  action  at  the  high  points  should  be  dra- 
matic but  with  sufficient  self-restraint  not  to 
suggest  the  stage.  Dramatic  and  funny  stories 
especially  appeal  to  children. 

If  you  both  think  and  act  the  story  as  you 
tell  it,  you  are  likely  also  to  feel  it,  and  this  is 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  43 

highly   desirable.      Get  into   the   spirit  of  the 
story  and  communicate  it.     As  you  do  so  little 
effective  additions  and  omissions  will  3  p^^j^ 
occur     to     you     spontaneously.      At  ^^^^ 
such    a    point    you    have    risen    above   detail 
and  have  become  a  master  of  the  art. 

Further,  by  attending  to  these  things  you 
will  have  forgotten  yourself,  which  is  also  nec- 
essary.    The  story  is  the  thing,  not  ^  g^j^, 
the  teller.     To  be  self-conscious  in  any  ^orgetfuUy 
way  is  distracting  to  both  the  attention  and  the 
interest  of  the  listeners. 

Finally,  if  the  story  have  a  moral,  tell  it  with 
indirection;  that  is,  let  the  moral  be  implicit, 
and  leave  the  children  themselves  to  g  ^.^ 
assimilate  it.  "In  vain  is  the  net  i^^ection 
spread  in  the  sight  of  any  bird."  This  is 
more  important  as  the  children  grow  older. 
The  moral  that  is  appended  is  an  anticlimax. 
The  approach  of  Nathan  to  David  with  the 
story  of  the  man  who  had  one  ewe  sheep  is  a 
model  of  indirection;  likewise  the  approach  of 
Hamlet  to  the  king  with  the  play  within  the 
play.     So  with  us,  the  moral  in  the  story,  not 


44  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

of  the  story,  is  the  thing  wherewith  we'll  catch 
the  conscience  of  the  child. 

"To  sum  it  all  up,  then,"  says  Miss  Bryant,^ 
*'let  us  say  of  the  method  likely  to  bring  suc- 
cess in  telling  stories,  that  it  includes  sympathy, 
grasp,  spontaneity;  one  must  appreciate  the 
story  and  know  it;  and  then,  using  the  realiz- 
ing imagination  as  a  constant  vivifying  force, 
and  dominated  by  the  mood  of  the  story,  one 
must  tell  it  with  all  one's  might,  —  simply, 
vitally,  joyously." 

Other  characteristics  of  the  good  story- 
teller mentioned  by  Haslett  ^  are  sincerity  and 
purpose,  accurate  memory,  agreeable  voice, 
correct  use  of  the  mother  tongue,  the  love  of 
nature,  and  a  keen  insight  into  the  child's 
mental  processes.  As  we  hear  a  story  told,  we 
might,  for  the  sake  of  practice,  look  for  as  many 
of  these  characteristics  in  the  telling  as  we  can 
find.  At  the  same  time  these  characteristics 
help  us  in  endeavoring  to  improve  our  own  art 
as  story-tellers. 

1  S.  C.  Bryant,  How  to  Tell  Stories  to  Children,  p.  109. 
«  S.  B.  Haslett,  Pedagogical  Bible  School,  p.  245. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  45 

One  of  the  habits  of  educational  thinking 
of  our  own  time  is  to  emphasize  the  expres- 
sive in  distinction  from  the  impressive  xj^e 
features  of  teaching.  The  teacher  im-  ff^cSen 
presses  the  child,  the  child  expresses  oi^  Stones 
himself;  in  the  process  of  self-expression,  the 
child  requires  the  guidance  of  the  teacher. 
This  emphasis  upon  expression  as  the 

1.  Teach- 

mode  of  development  is  in  harmony  ingby 

Expression 

with  the  physiological  fact  that  the 
motor  element  of  the  nervous  system  controls 
the  larger  muscles  of  the  body,  while  the  sen- 
sory element  controls  the  smaller  muscles; 
also  with  the  psychological  fact  that  opinions 
as  truly  follow  in  the  wake  of  deeds  as  deeds 
follow  opinions;  also  with  the  pragmatic  phi- 
losophy which  holds  that  action  is  of  primary 
while  ideas  are  only  of  secondary  importance  in 
our  world. 

This  same  habit  of  educational  procedure 
would  require  us  as  story-tellers  to  secure 
reactions  of  some  kind  from  the  children  upon 
the  stories  they  have  been  told.  Children  like 
to  re-tell  stories  they  have  enjoyed,  and  should 


46  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

be  encouraged  to  do  so  In  both  home  and  school. 
It  is  not  to  be  recommended,  however,  that  chil- 
dren be  formally  required  to  tell  again 

2.  Re- 

telling         those  storics  whose  prime  purpose  was 

stories  .       1  . 

moral  and  religious  inspiration ;  m  this 
case  the  re-telling  must  take  attention  away 
from  the  content  and  centre  it  upon  the  form  of 
the  story,  which  tends  to  remove  the  inspi- 
rational effect.  In  all  language  and  literary 
study  the  re-telling  has  its  proper  place. 

Another  way  of  securing  reactions  upon 
stories  from  children  is  to  let  them  illustrate 
3  nius-  ^^^  story  with  seat  work,  such  as  draw- 
trating  jj^g^  pasting  illustrative  pictures  cut 
from  magazines,  cutting  out  figures,  clay- 
modelling,  etc.  In  all  these  ways  the  children 
get  the  story  into  their  muscles.  As  Froebel 
says,  "Therefore,  with  boys  of  this  age,  the 
hearing  of  stories  should  always  be  connected 
with  some  activity  for  the  production  of  some 
external  work  on  their  part."^  Froebel  was  a 
master  of  children  himself  and  we  should  at- 
tend carefully  to  this  injunction  from  him. 

1  Op.  cit.»  p.  309. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  47 

Still  another  way  of  securing  reactions  upon 
stories  from  children  is  to  let  them  act  out  the 
story,  involving  the  dramatic  feature.  4  i^e 
The  art  of  dramatizing  stories  is  re-  tion^?*^" 
ceiving  increasing  attention  in  our  day.  S*®"®^ 
It  is  a  wonderfully  educative  procedure.    Why  ? 

To  begin  with,  children  are  naturally  imita- 
tors, mimics,  and  actors.  The  dramatic  ten- 
dency is  strong  in  them.  They  like  to  imper- 
sonate people  and  even  lower  animals.  This 
tendency  is  reenforced  by  whatever  they  may 
have  seen  on  the  stage  or  at  the  moving  pic- 
ture shows.  Acting  out  the  story  is  a  new  way 
of  self-expression  to  children.  At  times  they 
should  be  allowed  themselves  freely  to  throw 
the  story  material  into  dramatic  form,  thus 
stimulating  interest  and  ability  in  the  composi- 
tion of  dialogue. 

There  is  likewise  an  emotional  value  in  play- 
ing a  part  through  the  widening  of  sympathy 
that  comes  from  putting  oneself  in  another's 
place. 

Some  intellectual  values  are  likewise  present 
in  the  dramatizing  process,  such  as  vividness 


48  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

of  the  story  material  gained  by  representation, 
fixation  of  the  material  in  memory,  and  the 
cultivation  of  the  imagination.  Certain  sub- 
jects, like  history,  especially  profit  by  the  use 
of  the  dramatic  art,  and  the  more  so  if  costum- 
ing suitable  to  the  period  is  utilized. 

In  addition  it  interests  the  parents  to  have 
their  children  appear  in  school  plays,  espe- 
cially if  requisition  is  made  on  the  home 
for  costumes.  On  the  whole,  whether  we 
go  into  the  dramatizing  of  stories  very 
simply  or  elaborately,  it  is  a  school  art  we 
cannot  afiFord  entirely  to  neglect  in  our  story 
work. 

The  story  has  a  proper  place  in  all  subjects 
through  all  grades  of  education,  from  kinder- 
The  Place  g^rten  to  professional  graduate  school ; 
stonTin  ^^  incidental  place,  perhaps,  but  none 
Education  |.]^g  j^gg  influential  for  being  so.  It  is 
probably  better  to  use  a  story  in  any  subject 
when  the  occasion  calls  for  it  than  to  formalize 
the  story-telling  by  using  it  only  at  a  sched- 
uled hour.  The  subjects  that  lend  themselves 
particularly  to  story-telling  are  nature-study. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  49 

literature,  history,  and  morals.  It  were  well 
if  a  given  school  system  assigned  certain  stories 
to  certain  grades,  to  secure  proper  adaptation 
of  the  stories  to  the  experience  of  the  children, 
to  prevent  undue  repetition,  and  to  acquaint 
the  succeeding  teacher  with  the  story  material 
the  children  have  already  had.  Miss  Tobey's 
suggestions  on  this  point  are  included  at  the 
end  of  this  chapter. 

For  those  who  would  become  adept  story- 
tellers,  as    all   fathers,    mothers,    and 

Parting 

teachers  should  do,  a  few  parting  sug-  Sug- 

gestions 

gestions  may  be  ventured.     The  first 

is  to  read  and  assimilate  the  racial  stories,  to 

do    which    is    to    give    ourselves    the  i.  Read 

the  Racial 

understanding     and     appreciation     of  stories 
the  primitive  mind  which  the  child  represents. 
Another  is  to  study  the  principles  of  story- 
telling   as    students    have    abstracted 

2.  Study 

them  from  the  best  practice  of  the  thePrin- 

,  .         r»     T  ciples  of 

ages.     To    assist    readers    m    finding  story- 

.  tt  -tj  1*       •      1  telling 

stones  to  tell  as  well  as  studies  in  how 

to  tell  them,  a  list  of  references  is  appended  to 

this  chapter. 


50  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

Still  another  suggestion  is  to  practise  inter- 
minably   and   practise    intelligently.      As   you 
practise    study    the    qualities    of    the 

3.  Practice 

story  that  make  it  go  as  well  as  those 
that  cause  it  to  lag.  Criticise  your  own  work, 
and  seek  to  improve  upon  it.  In  a  public 
address  Kate  Douglas  Wiggin,  called  ''the 
owner  of  the  golden  key  to  childhood"  by 
Hamilton  Wright  Mabie,  said:  ''If  one  has 
ever  told  stories  to  children,  one  realizes  that 
the  main  thing  is  to  keep  them  from  wriggling ; 
for  once  they  commence,  all  inspiration  vanishes. 
When  you  have  told  a  story  that  does  this,  you 
have  done  your  Homeric  best." 

Finally  the  warning  suggested  by  the  dis- 
cussion of  fact  and  fancy  in  stories  at  the  out- 
set may  here  be  repeated,  viz.  tell  as 

4.  Tell 

little  to  be    little   as  possible  that  children  must 

Unlearned 

later  unlearn.  In  case  of  doubt  it  is 
better  to  err  on  the  side  of  calling  fact  fancy 
than  of  calling  fancy  fact.  The  danger  in 
the  process  of  unlearning  is  that  it  may  over- 
reach itself  and  call  the  verities  into  equal 
question. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  51 

One  real  problem  of  the  teacher  is  how  to 
keep  young  though  growing  old.  There  is  an 
attractiveness  about  growing  old  and  youth  and 
going  on,  if  it  can  be  done  in  the  right  ^^® 
way,  as  with  Browning's  Rabbi  Ben  Ezra. 
There  is  also  an  attractiveness  about  remaining 
young  and  enjoying  with  Wordsworth  the  chil- 
dren that  '* sport  upon  the  shore."  But  how 
to  do  both  at  the  same  time.f^  The  story  is 
the  answer,  for  it  is  both  as  young  as  the  child 
and  as  old  as  the  race.  The  story  will  develop 
the  children  and  at  the  same  time  preserve 
the  story-teller. 

The  place  of  the  story  in  the  family  circle 
is  akin  to  that  of  music.  In  the  now  out-of- 
print  and  sole  novel  of  Sidney  Lanier, 

Lanier,  on 

the  musical  poet  of  America  after  Poe,  Music  in 

.  1     tt/-..  the  Home 

he  wrote  concernmg  a  home  :  ^  Cjiven 
the  raw  materials,  to  wit,  wife,  children,  a 
friend  or  two,  and  a  house,  —  two  other  things 
are  necessary.  These  are  a  good  fire  and  good 
music.  And  inasmuch  as  we  can  do  without 
the  fire  for  half  the  year,  I  may  say  that  music 

» Quoted  in  Painter,  Poets  of  the  South,  p.  87,  N.  Y.,  1903. 


52  THREE   SCHOOL  ARTS 

is  the  one  essential.  After  the  evening  spent 
around  the  piano,  or  the  flute,  or  the  vioHn, 
how  warm  and  how  chastened  is  the  kiss  with 
which  the  family  all  say  good  night !  Ah,  the 
music  has  taken  all  the  day  cares  and  thrown 
them  into  its  terrible  alembic  and  boiled  them 
and  rocked  them  and  cooled  them,  till  they 
are  crystallized  into  one  care,  which  is  a  most 
sweet  and  rare  desirable  sorrow  —  the  yearning 
for  God."  For  those  who  have  tried  it,  the  story 
has  the  same  cleansing  effect. 

A  contemporary  writer,  McLandburgh  Wil- 
son, has  the  following  lines  on  "The  Rarest 
Time": 

Love  will  often  come  again. 

Though  the  first  be  best ; 
Second  childhood  comes  to  men. 

Though  'tis  robbed  of  zest. 
Opportunity  comes  back. 

Only  changing  guise ; 
Through  the  centuries  return 

Comets  in  the  skies. 
History  repeats  itself, 

Rings  again  its  chime ; 
But  the  fairies  only  come 

Once  upon  a  time. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  53 

REFERENCES  ON  STORIES  AND  STORY-TELLING 
I.  Where  to  Find  Stories 

1.  Alden,  Why  the  Chimes  Rang.     Bobbs-Merrill  Co. 

2.  Bailey  and  Lewis,  For  the  Story  Hour.    Milton  Bradley  Co. 

3.  Baldwin,  J.,  Fifty  Famous  Stories.     Book  Supply  Co. 

4.  Baldwin,  J.,  Old  Stories  of  the  East.     N.  Y.,  1896. 

5.  Beckwith,  M.  H.,  In  Mythland.     Boston,  1896. 

6.  Bennett  and  Adeney,    Bible    Story    Retold    for    Young 

People.     The  Macmillan  Co. 

7.  Bird,  R.,  One  Hundred  Bible  Stories  for  Children.     N.  Y., 

1911. 

8.  Brooklyn    Public    Library,    Books    That    Girls    Like.     A 

Pamphlet  List. 

9.  Bryant,  S.  C,  Stories  to  Tell  to  Children.     Boston,  1907. 

10.  Burnett,  The  Land  of  the  Blue  Flower.     Moffat,  Yard  &  Co. 

11.  Canton,  Child's  Book  of  Saints.    N.  Y.,  1907. 

12.  Coe,  First  Book  of  Stories.     Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

13.  Coe,  Second  Book  of  Stories.     Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

14.  Cooke,  F.  J.,  Nature  Myths  and  Stories.     Boston,  1895. 

15.  CowLES,  Stories  to  Tell.     A.  Flannagan  &  Co. 

16.  Craqin,  L.  E.,  Kindergarten  Bible  Stories,     2  vols.     N.  Y., 

1905. 

17.  Gaskoin,  Mrs.  H.,  Children's  Treasury  of  Bible  Stories. 

N.  Y.,  1896. 

-48.  Gow»Y,  J.  L.,  Special  Days  in  School.    Minneapolis,  1902. 

19.  Greene,  With  Spurs  of  Gold.     Little,  Brown  &  Co. 

20.  Harrison,  In  Storyland.     The  Central  Publishing  Co. 

21.  Hodges,  G.,  When  the  King  Came.     Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

22.  Hodges,  G.,  The  Garden  of  Eden.     Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

23.  Hodges,  G.,  Saints  and  Heroes.     Henry  Holt  &  Co. 

24.  HoLBROOK,  Book  of  Nature  Myths.     Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

25.  HowLisTON,  Cat  Tales  and  Other  Tales.     Book  Supply  Co. 

26.  Kingsley,  Heroes.     Chas.  Scribner's  Sons. 

27.  Johnson,  Oak  Tree  Fairy  Book.     Little,  Brown  &  Co. 

28.  Klingensmith,  Household  Stories.     A.  Flannagan  &  Co. 

29.  Lang,  A.,  The  Green  Fairy  Book.    Longmans,  Green  &  Co. 


54  THREE   SCHOOL  ARTS 

80.  Lang,  A.,  The  Blue  Fairy  Book.     Longmans,  Green  &  Co. 

31.  Lang,  A.,  The  Animal  Story  Book.    Longmans,  Green  &  Co. 

32.  Lang,  A.,  The  Red  Story  Book.     Longmans,  Green  &  Co. 

33.  Lansing,  Rhymes  and  Stories.     Ginn  &  Co. 

34.  Lindsay,  Mother  Stories.     Milton,  Bradley  Co. 

35.  Mabie,  H.  W.,  Stories  Every  Child  Should  Know.     Double- 

day,  Page  &  Co. 

36.  Mabie,  H.  W.,  Fairy  Tales  Every  Child  Should  Know. 

Doubleday,  Page  &  Co. 

37.  Menefee,    Child  Stories  from   the   Masters.     Rand   Mc- 

Nally  Co. 

38.  MouLTON,  R.  G.,  Bible  Stories  for  Children.     2  vols.     The 

Macmillan  Co. 

39.  PouLssoN,  E.,  In  the  Child's  World.     Milton,  Bradley  Co. 

40.  PouLssoN,  E.,  For  the  Children's  Hour.     Ginn  &  Co. 

41.  PYiiE,  The  Wonder  Clock.     Harper  Bros. 

42.  Richards,  L.,  The  Silver  Crown.     Boston,  1906. 

43.  Richards,  L.,  The  Golden  Windows.     Little,  Brown  &  Co. 

44.  ScuDDER,  H.  E.,  Book  of  Legends.     Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

45.  ScuDDER,    H.    E.,    Fables    and    Folk    Stories.     Houghton 

Mifflin  Co. 

46.  Speer,  R.  E.,  Servants  of  the  King.     N.  Y.,  1909. 

47.  Storr,  Half  a  Hundred  Hero  Tales.     Henry  Holt  &  Co. 

48.  Tappan,    E.    V.    (Ed.),    The   Children's   Hour.     10    vols. 

Boston,  1907. 

49.  Underbill,  T.  D.,  The  Dwarf's  Tailor.     N.  Y.,  1896. 

50.  WiGGiN  AND  Smith,  The  Story  Hour.    Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

51.  WiGGiN  AND  Smith,  Tales  of  Laughter.    Doubleday,  Page 

&  Co. 

52.  Wyche,  R.  T.,  Some  Great  Stories  and  How  to  Tell  Them. 

N.  Y.,  1910. 

II.   How  TO  Tell  Stories 

1.  Allen,  Ezra,  The  Pedagogy  of  Myth  in  the  Grades.    Ped. 

Sem.,  Vol.  VIII. 

2.  Baker,  F.  T.,  "Literature,  Children's,"  Art.  in  Monroe's 

Cyclopaedia  of  Education. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  55 

3.  Bryant,  S.  C,  How  to  Tell  Stories  to  Children.     Boston, 

1905. 

4.  Chamberlain,  A.  F.,  Folk  Lore  in  the  Schools.     Ped.  Sem.y 

Vol.  Vn.     Has  bibliography. 

5.  Dye,  Charity,  The  Story-Teller's  Art.     Boston,  1898. 

6.  Fenelon,    Education    of    Girls,       Chap.    VI.      Boston, 

1891. 

7.  Gould,  F.  J.,  Moral  Instruction,  Its  Theory  and  Practice. 

N.  Y.,  1913. 

8.  Haslett,  S.  B.,  The  Pedagogical  Bible  School.     N.  Y., 

1903. 

9.  Houghton,  L.  S.,  Telling  Bible  Stories.     Scribner. 

10.  Houghton,  L.  S.,  "The  Use  of  the  Story,"  Proc.  R.  E.  A.y 

1907,  pp.  239-243. 

11.  Keyes,  Angela  M.,  Stories  and  Story-Telling.     Appleton. 

12.  Lawrence,   W.   W.,   Mediaeval   Story.      Columbia   Univ. 

Press,  1911. 

13.  Lyman,  Edna,  Story-Telling.     Chicago,  1910. 

14.  Moore,    Annie  E.,    "Story-Telling,"    Art.    in    Monroe's 

Cyclopaedia  of  Education. 

15.  MouLTON,   R.   G.,   "The  Art  of  Telling   Bible   Stories," 

Proc.  R,  E.  A.,  1904,  pp.  26-30. 

16.  Partridge,  E.  N.  and  G.  E.,  Story-Telling  in  School  and 

Home.     Sturgis  &  Walton. 

17.  Shedlock,  Miss,  The  Art  of  Story-Telling. 

18.  Smith,   Nora   A.,    "Story-Telling   in   the   Kindergarten," 

Proc.  N.  E.  A.,  1889. 

19.  St.  John,  E.  P.,  Stories  and  Story-Telling.     The  Pilgrim 

Press. 

20.  Tobey,  Marian  E.,  Story  List  for  Primary  Grades.     The 

Elmira  School  Bulletin,  Vol.  V,  No.  1. 

21.  Williams,  L.  A.,  "The  Function  of  the  Story  in  the  High 

School."     The  Story -Teller's  Magazine,  Vol.  II,  No.  3. 

m.  Lists  of  Graded  Stories 

From  Miss  Tobcy's  article  on   "Story  Lists   for  Primary 
Grades"  in  the  Elmira  School  Bulletin,  Vol.  V,  No.  1. 


56  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

SUB-PRIMARY   STORY   LIST 

The  Three  Billy  Goats  Gruff. 

The  Old  Woman  and  Her  Pig. 

The  Three  Bears. 

The  Pancake. 

The  Gingerbread  Boy. 

The  House  That  Jack  Built. 

Chicken  Little. 

The  Pig  Brother. 

The  Little  Red  Hen  That  Found  the  Grain  of  Wheat. 

The  Ant  and  the  Grasshopper. 

The  Dog  and  His  Shadow. 

The  Fox  and  the  Little  Red  Hen. 

Town  Mouse  and  City  Mouse. 

The  Town  Musicians. 

The  Hill  and  the  Little  Boy. 

Five  Peas  in  a  Pod. 

The  Lion  and  the  Mouse. 

Billy  Boy. 

The  Cat  Learns  to  Dance. 

Belling  the  Cat. 

Little  Red  Riding  Hood. 

The  Straw,  the  Coal,  and  the  Bean. 

The  Little  Plant. 

The  Three  Little  Pigs. 

Titty  Mouse  and  Tatty  Mouse. 


FIRST-GRADE  STO: 

Little  Mouse  Pie. 

Poplar  Tree. 

The  Anxious  Leaf. 

The  Little  Jackal  and  the  Alligator. 

The  Crane  Express. 

The  Elves  and  the  Shoemaker. 

The  Boy  Who  Cried  "Wolf,  Wolf." 

Epaminondas  and  His  Auntie. 

The  Foolish  Weathervane. 


Qi] 


THE  AKT  OF  STORY-TELLING  57 

The  Goose  and  the  Golden  Eggs. 

Little  Half-Chick. 

The  Fox  and  the  Grapes. 

How  the  Chipmunk  Got  His  Stripes. 

The  Discontented  Pine  Tree. 

Briar  Rose. 

One  Good  Trick. 

The  Blind  Man  and  the  Lame  Man. 

The  Lion  and  the  Jackals. 

Johnny  Cake. 

The  Sleeping  Apple. 

The  Thrifty  Squirrel. 

Lambikin. 

The  Hare  and  the  Tortoise. 

Jack  and  the  Beanstalk. 

Timothy's  Shoes. 

The  Brownies. 

Little  Black  Sambo. 

SECOND-GRADE   STORIES 

Why  the  Evergreen  Trees  Keep  Their  Leaves. 

The  Wind  and  the  Sun. 

Goldenrod  and  the  Aster. 

Little  Pink  Rose. 

Dog  in  the  Manger. 

Jack  the  Giant-Killer. 

The  Fox  in  the  Well. 

One  Eye,  Two  Eyes,  and  Three  Eyes. 

Puss-in-Boots. 

Sleeping  Beauty. 

Snow-White  and  Rose-Red. 

How  the  Robin  Got  His  Red  Breast. 

Midas  and  the  Golden  Touch. 

North  Wmd. 

Why  the  Sea  Is  Salt. 

The  Little  Jackal  and  the  CameL 

The  Little  Jackal  and  the  Lion. 


58  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

Kinkach  Martinko. 

King  Solomon  and  the  Ants. 

The  Crow  and  the  Cheese. 

The  Honest  Woodman. 

Hop-o'-my-Thumb. 

Cinderella. 

Peter  Rabbit. 

How  Brother  Rabbit  Fooled  the  Whale  and  the  Elephant. 

How  Mrs.  White  Hen  Helped  Rose. 

THIRD-GRADE   STORIES 

The  Legend  of  Arbutus. 

Beauty  and  the  Beast. 

Bluebeard. 

The  Engine  Story. 

The  Shut-up  Posy. 

Rumpel-stilts-kin. 

The  Brave  Tin  Soldier. 

The  Feast  of  the  Lanterns. 

The  Golden  Bird  and  the  Good  Hare. 

The  Frog  Prince. 

The  Red-Headed  Woodpecker. 

Hansel  and  Gretel. 

Match  Girl. 

Toads  and  Diamonds. 

Bruce  and  the  Spider. 

Nuremberg  Stove. 

The  Star  Dollars. 

Hans,  Who  Made  the  Princess  Laugh. 

The  White  Cat. 

Narcissus. 

The  Discontented  Mill  Window. 

The  Lost  Child. 

Sinbad,  the  Sailor. 

Apple-Seed  John. 

The  Enchanted  Horse. 

The  Pot  of  Gold. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  59 

The  Enchanted  Wine  Jug,  or  Why  the  Cat  and  Dog  Are  Enemies. 

The  Red  Shoes. 

The  Sbc  Swans. 

Ugly  Duckling. 

Classic  Myths  —  Clytie,  Etc. 

FOURTH-GRADE   STORIES 

The  Last  Lesson. 

The  Knights  of  the  Silver  Shield. 

Why  the  Chimes  Rang  (Alden). 

William  Tell. 

King  Alfred  and  the  Beggar. 

King  Alfred  and  the  Cakes. 

Jason  and  the  Golden  Fleece. 

Adventures  of  Ulysses. 

Aladdin  and  His  Lamp. 

Robin  Hood. 

Hercules. 

Theseus. 

Orpheus  and  Eurydice. 

Iduna's  Garden. 

Iduna's  Fall. 

Iduna's  Return. 

The  Beautiful  Apples. 

Cadmus  and  the  Dragon's  Teeth. 

Expedition  of  the  Argonauts. 

How  Thor  Found  His  Hammer,  and  other  Norse  tales. 

Siegfried's  Adventures. 

Prometheus. 

Balder  and  the  Mistletoe. 

Toomai  of  the  Elephants  (Kipling). 

Rikki-tikki-tavi  (Kipling). 

Sinbad's  Voyage,  or  How  Apollo  Got  His  Lyre. 

Rip  Van  Winkle. 

The  Pied  Piper. 

Perseus. 

Achilles. 


60  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

Darius. 

Pandora's  Box. 

The  Nightingale. 

How  the  Camel  Got  His  Hump. 

The  Elephant  Child. 

Pan  and  Apollo. 

Damon  and  Pythias. 

Cornelia  and  Her  Jewels. 

The  Burning  of  the  Rice  Fields. 

King  of  the  Golden  River. 

Questions  on  the  Art  of  Story-Telling 

1.  Why  is  civilization  hard  on  story- telling  ? 

2.  What  are  some  signs  of  a  revival  of  interest  in  story- 
telling ? 

3.  Give  six  illustrations  of  racial  stories. 

4.  Define  the  story  and  show  the  meaning  of  the  definition. 

5.  What  are  the  four  elements  in  the  form  of  each  story  ? 

6.  What  is  the  main  purpose  of  story- telling  ?     Name  some 
other  aims.     Compare  Lincoln's  use  of  the  story. 

7.  Give  three  reasons  why  the  story  is  important. 

8.  Name  as  many  characteristics  of  the  good  story  as  you  can. 

9.  Describe  eight  ways  in  which  a  story  should  be  told. 

10.  Why  is  it  important  that  children  should  re-act  on  stories 
they  have  heard  ? 

11.  Describe  several  ways  in  which  children  may  re-act  on 
stories. 

12.  Discuss  fully  the  educational  value  of  dramatizing  stories. 

13.  What  is  the  place  of  the  story  in  education  ? 

14.  How  may  one  become  a  better  story-teller  ? 

15.  Why  does  story-telling  help  to  keep  the  soul  young  ? 

16.  Which  of  the  books  in  the  reference  lists  have  you  read  ? 

Suggestions  for  Further  Study 

1.  Compare  the  form  of  the  story  with  that  of  the  drama. 

2.  Compare  the  story  with  the  essay  as  to  concreteness  of 
presentation.     Illustrate. 


THE  ART  OF  STORY-TELLING  61 

3.  Work  out  the  four  elements  in  the  form  of  the  story  as 
they  appear  in  three  stories  you  tell  your  class. 

4.  What  results  do  you  achieve  by  story-telling  ? 

5.  What  is  some  of  the  folk-lore  of  your  community? 

6.  Why  are  children  so  interested  in  stories  ? 

7.  In  what  consists  your  own  weakness  as  a  story-teller  ? 

8.  Why  is  it  better  to  tell  than  to  read  a  story  ? 

9.  What  have  you  noticed  as  to  the  repetition  by  children 
of  stories  they  have  heard? 

10.  Is  a  story-teller  born  or  made  ? 

11.  Can  you  illustrate  from  your  own  case  having  to  unlearn 
things  once  told  you  ? 

12.  Distinguish  legend,  myth,  and  fairy  story. 

13.  Why  does  the  advance  of  science  not  tend  to  displace 
works  of  imagination  ? 

14.  What  are  the  effects  on  children  of  reading  too  many 
stories?  Of  reading  stories  too  advanced  for  them?  Of  read- 
ing only  "children's  stories" ? 

15.  Was  Aristotle  right  in  saying  "poetry  is  truer  than  his- 
tory"?   Why? 

16.  Characterize  the  method  of  story-telling  of  some  person 
you  know. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  AET  OF  QUESTIONING  ^ 

In    his    most    important    dialogue    and    the 
most  important  ancient  document  on  educa- 
tion,    the     Republic,     Plato     wrote: 

Plato  on 

Question-    "Then  you  will  enact  that  they  [the 

ing 

rulers]  shall  have  such  an  education 
as  will  enable  them  to  attain  the  greatest  skill 
in  asking  and  answering  questions."  ^  Plato 
appreciated  the  value  of  such  skill  through 
having  been  for  eight  years  a  pupil  of  the 
incomparable  questioner,  Socrates.  In  fact, 
the  questions  of  Socrates  gave  rise  to  the 
dialectic  philosophy  of  Plato  and  to  the  dia- 
logue form  into  which  it  was  cast,  whence  in 
turn  came  the  mediaeval  disputations  and  the 
modern  debates,  dialogues,  and  other  forms  of 
"the    Socratic   Art."     But    teachers   have   not 

^  This  chapter  is  rewritten  from  three  short  papers  that  appeared  in 
The  Pilgrim  Teacher,  Boston,  March,  April,  and  May,  1903. 
2  Republic  (Jowett  Tr.),  534  D. 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  63 

yet  attained  that  skill  in  questioning  which 
Plato  desired.  To  him  questioning  was  the 
preferred  method  of  teaching  the  most  advanced 
subject,  —  dialectic,  or  the  knowledge  of  the 
ultimate  ideas.  As  it  was  by  questioning  that 
Socrates  developed  the  concept,  so  it  was  by 
questioning  that  Plato  reached  the  ideas,  which 
to  him  were  the  only  absolute  realities. 

The  phases  of  this  art  in  teaching  that  will 
engage  us  successively  are :  the  importance  of 
questioning,    the    purposes    of    ques- 

1        1  •     1         P  •  Outline  of 

tioning,  the  kinds  of  questions  that  this 
teachers  may  ask,  the  manner  of  ques- 
tioning, the  form  of  the  question,  the  content 
of  the  question,  the  questioner  himself,  the  an- 
swer, and  certain  illustrations  of  great  ques- 
tioners, including  Socrates  and  Jesus.  This 
is  a  large  outlay,  but  perhaps  no  larger  than 
the  relative  importance  of  the  subject  itself 
warrants. 

If  we  inquire  whether  the  exalted  position 
assigned  questioning  in  teaching  by  Plato  in 
the  quotation  above  and  the  history  of  edu- 
cation be  justified,  we  are  left  in  no  doubt  in 


64  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

the  light  of  reason.  Questioning  is  one  of  the 
supreme  methods  by  which  a  maturer  mind 
Theim-  ^^^  assist  a  learner's  growing  men- 
^°^g^Q^°^  tality.  It  best  enables  teacher  and 
"^2  pupil    to  work   together,   standing   in 

contrast  both  with  the  lecture  method,  which 
tends  to  make  pupils  passive,  and  with 

A  Main  i-    i'       ^ 

Mode  of      the    let-alone    method,    which    leaves 

Teaching 

them  unguided.  The  question  both 
guides  and  stirs  to  action. 

We  begin  to  realize  how  important  it  is  to 
question  well  in  teaching  when  we  estimate 
The  Tune  ^hat  proportion  of  our  classroom  allot- 
it  Takes  ment  of  time  is  devoted  to  the  back- 
and-forth  asking  and  answering  between  teacher 
and  pupils.  In  all  grades  of  work  below  uni- 
versity classes  and  their  equivalent,  educational 
custom  has  assigned  to  the  question  the  burden 
of  teaching.  A  real  question  is  a  sign  of  a 
mind  alive,  and  the  question-mark  is  the  best 
symbol  of  the  reaction  of  man's  intelligence  on 
his  world. 

To  question  well  is  to  secure  attention, 
through  the  very  fact  of  requiring  a  response. 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  65 

The  rising  inflection  of  the  voice  catches 
the  attention  through  suggesting  that  a  reply 
is   expected.      The   question    interests 

An  Aid  in 

the  mind  through  assigning   it   some-  Securing 

Attention 

thing  to  do,  and,  if  well  asked,  it  also 
appeals  to  the  mind  to  show  its  power.  To  an 
interesting  question  one  likes  to  attend;  even 
to  an  uninteresting  question  that  tests  our 
powers  we  prefer  to  attend,  lest  our  answer  or 
the  want  of  it  reveal  us  to  be  weaker  than  we 
are.  Thus  good  questions  will  win  for  teachers 
both  the  involuntary  and  the  voluntary  atten- 
tion. 

Further,  good  questioning  secures  better  class 
management.  The  class  engaged  with  ques- 
tions   being    asked    by    an    interested 

^  and  Class 

teacher  has  no  occasion  for  disorder.  Manage- 
ment 
Managing  a  class  is  never  an  end  in 

itself,  but  only  a  means  for  doing  the  business 

in  hand ;    if  the  problem   of  managing  sinks 

out  of    sight    through    the    engrossing    mental 

activity  of  teacher  and  pupil  alike,  so  much 

the  better.     Good  questioning  is  not  the  whole 

secret  of  managing,  but  it  is  a  part  of  it. 


66  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

Lastly,  on  the  importance  of  questioning,  it 
is  enough  to  say  that  good  questioning  is  good 
To  Ques-  teaching.  A  poor  questioner  cannot 
is^to Teach  ^^  ^  good  teacher,  though  he  may  be 
^®^  a  good  lecturer,  and  a  good  questioner 

cannot  fail  altogether  as  a  teacher.  For  teach- 
ing is  the  art  of  stimulating  mental  growth, 
and  nothing  does  this  better  than  the  right  kind 
of  questioning.  Despite  the  fact  that  ques- 
tioning as  a  rule  is  so  poorly  done,  it  is  encour- 
aging to  us  that  no  one  of  the  teacher's  arts  is 
so  easily  improvable  by  thought  and  effort  as 
this  of  questioning,  and  improvement  is  no- 
where more  rewarded  in  teaching  than  here. 
Questioning  is  that  one  of  the  arts  in  teaching 
most  easily  mechanized,  though  it  cannot  be 
completely  mechanized.  And  for  all  it  is  so 
important  an  art  and  occupies  so  large  a  place 
in  teaching,  it  is  by  no  means  all  there  is  to 
teaching. 

What  are  the  main  purposes  in  questioning? 
Or,  what  are  the  main  uses  to  which  questions 
may  be  put?  The  answer  is  important  not 
only   for   its   own   sake,   but   for   the   sake  of 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  67 

determining  presently  the  different  kinds  of 
questions.  There  are  four  main  purposes  for 
which    teachers    use    questions.      The 

The  Gen- 
first  purpose  is  to  secure  and  to  keep  eraiPur- 

•  1        1  •     1         1.      1  poses  of 

contact  with  the  mmds  of  the  class.  Question- 

ing 

The  second,  the  largest  and  most  com- 
plex purpose  of  the  four,  is  to  set  forward  the 
attainment  of  the  class  in  a  given  field.  The 
third  purpose  is  to  review  the  material  covered. 
And  the  fourth  purpose  is  to  examine  the  class, 
with  a  view  to  determining  not  merely  what 
the  pupils  do  not  know,  but  also  what  they  do 
know,  what  their  needs  are,  and  how  efiicient 
the  instruction  has  been. 

The  second  purpose  requires  a  few  further 
words  of  exposition.  In  setting  forward  the  at- 
tainment of  the  class  in  a  given  field,  several 
things  are  involved.  These  are :  doing  justice 
to  the  pupil,  by  both  advancing  his  knowledge 
and  developing  his  initiative,  and  doing  justice 
to  the  subject.  In  doing  justice  to  the  subject 
the  method  of  questioning  has  one  of  its  main 
uses.  A  new  subject  may  be  presented  not  by 
lecture  nor  by  reliance  on  a  text,  but  by  a  series 


68  THEEE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

of  closely  connected  questions  bringing  out  the 
main  features  of  the  new  material.  It  is 
rather  a  difficult  form  of  questioning  to  use, 
though,  when  well  done,  the  results  are  realistic 
to  the  class.  Ziller  and  other  German  Herbar- 
tians  have  particularly  commended  it. 

The  further  details  involved  in  each  of  these 
four  main  purposes  or  uses  of  questioning  will 
appear  in  our  discussion  of  the  corresponding 
kinds  of  question  now  to  follow. 

We  may  distinguish  the  kinds  of  question, 

according  to  the  four  main  purposes  they  serve, 

by  the  aid  of   the  followinej  names: 

The  Kinds        ^ 

of  first,  the  auxiliary ;  second,  the  search- 

Question     .' *^  .    .        1^*   1     1 

mg  or  heuristic ;  third,  the  review ;  and 

foujcth,  the  examinational.  Let  us  briefly  de- 
scribe the  character  and  the  more  detailed 
purposes  of  each  of  these  kinds  of  question. 

The  very  name  of  the  auxiliary  question 
indicates  its  subsidiary  character.  Its  main 
Character  purpose  is  to  effect  and  to  keep  ad- 
AuSuary  justment  between  the  teacher  and  the 
Question  ^lass.  It  is  also  distinguished  from 
the  other  kinds  of  question  in  that  it  does  not 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  69 

put  the  pupil  on  his  mettle;  it  calls  for  only 
a  descriptive  answer  from  him,  which  in  no 
way  reflects  credit  or  discredit  upon  his  mental 
attainment  or  ability. 

The  auxiliary  question  would  be  illustrated 
by  the  preliminary  inquiries  of  the  class  by  the 
teacher  in  order  to  learn  what  their  lustra- 
previous  experience  or  training  had  ^^^^ 
been  that  would  suggest  the  "point  of  con- 
tact," as  Patterson  Dubois  calls  it,  between 
pupil  and  lesson.  Also,  such  questions  as, 
"Is  there  any  point  in  the  lesson  not  clear  to 
any  member  of  the  class  .f^"  "\Vliat  is  your 
difficulty  with  this  point?"  "Is  what  I  have 
just  explained  clear  to  everybody .f^ "  "Will 
anybody  ask  me  a  question  on  any  matter  in 
the  lesson?"  "Why  did  you  make  the  particu- 
lar mistake  you  did?"  etc.  Naturally  such 
auxiliary  questions  may  fall  at  the  beginning, 
in  the  course  of,  or  at  the  conclusion  of,  the 
recitation.  In  lecturing  to  older  classes  par- 
ticularly it  is  important  semi-occasionally  to 
stop  and  ask  such  questions  as,  "What  point 
have  I  just  been  making?"     "Is  there  any 


70  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

question?"    in  order   to  give  passive  listeners 

an  active  role,  in  order  to  give  warning  that 

lecturing  does  not  invite  inattention,  and  also 

to  preclude  talking  ''over  the  heads"  of  the 

students. 

As  its  name  indicates,  this  question  goes  on 

a  quest;    "without  a  quest,  no  conquest."     It 

would  discover  new  truth,  or  new  ap- 
Character 

of  the         prehension  of  old  truth,  or  the  bearing 

Searching 

or  Heuristic  of  truth  on  life,  or  develop  unsuspected 
mental  functions.  It  would  also  with 
advanced  classes  lead  to  mental  invention, 
in  the  formulation  of  hypotheses,  in  the  ex- 
pression of  judgments,  in  the  processes  of 
reasoning.  As  this  is  probably  the  most  im- 
portant of  the  four  types  of  question  we  must 
pay  especial  attention  to  its  purposes. 

To  be  specific,  we  may  distinguish  five  pur- 
poses of  the  heuristic  question,  viz.  (1)  to  dis- 
cover what  the  pupil  has  learned  about  the 
lesson,  and,  in  case  of  conceit  of  knowledge  or 
of  the  effort  to  seem  to  possess  what  he  does 
not,  to  convince  him  publicly,  in  Socratic  fash- 
ion,   of    ignorance.      It    must    be    evident    to 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  71 

all,  however,  that  this  painful  process  is  ani- 
mated by  the  motive  of  sympathy  and  well- 
wishing  on  the  part  of  the  teacher,  never  by  the 
desire  to  entrap  or  win  a  point. 

(^To  discover  how  the  pupil  knows,  whether 
verbally  or  really,  whether  vaguely  or  definitely, 
whether  theoretically  or  practically,  whether 
honestly  or  dishonestly,  etc.  In  case  the  man- 
ner of  knowledge  is  unsatisfactory,  the  teacher 
must  show  by  one  question  following  another 
the  more  acceptable  way. 

(^To  improve  the  character  of  knowledge, 
by  fixing  it  through  answers  and  repetition, 
by  correcting  it  as  the  answers  reveal  the  need 
of  correction,  by  emphasizing  essentials  and 
neglecting  non-essentials.  The  members  of  the 
class  should  never  be  left  in  doubt  as  to  what  the 
correct  answer  is,  or,  in  case  of  a  mooted  point, 
as  to  what  the  teacher  personally  thinks. 

(4)^To  train  expression  in  answering.  In 
a  sense,  a  secondary  sense,  it  is  true  that  every 
lesson  is  an  English  lesson ;  in  any  classroom 
slangy  or  ungrammatical  answers  and  mispro- 
nunciations should  not  go   uncorrected.     And 


72  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

the  way  to  correct  them  is  to  have  the  pupil 
repeat  the  corrected  form.  This  should  be 
done  by  way  of  parenthesis  in  other  class- 
rooms than  the  English.  It  always  requires 
tact  to  make  such  corrections,  and,  in  the 
case  of  older  pupils,  it  had  better  be  done  in 
private. 

In  this  connection  it  should  be  remarked 
that  clarity  of  expression  is  dependent  not 
simply  upon  vocabulary,  but  also  upon  clarity 
of  thinking.  To  demand  simple  and  clear 
answers  is  therefore  to  encourage  that  sim- 
plicity and  clearness  of  thinking  which,  as 
Descartes  said,  the  truth  demands. 

(5)  To  develop  initiative,  self-activity,  the 
sense  of  power,  and  mental  grasp  of  life.  The 
heuristic  question  goes  beyond  the  known  facts 
possessed  by  the  pupil  into  the  region  of  his 
reaction  upon  them  in  terms  of  judgment  and 
reason.  To  answer  a  question  involving  mem- 
ory requires  indeed  mental  activity,  but  to 
answer  a  question  involving  judgment  requires 
self-activity,  and  the  answer  is  self-expression, 
revealing  mental  quality.     A  fact  remembered 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  73 

may  be  the  same  for  all,  a  fact  judged  may 
differ  in  the  case  of  each  pupil.  By  means  of 
the  questions  that  pursue  him  into  the  inmost 
recesses  of  his  mentality,  that  throw  the  mind 
back  upon  itself  in  reflection,  the  true  teacher 
makes  the  pupil  aware  of  his  unsuspected  mental 
powers,  gives  him  the  joy  of  self-discovery,  and 
becomes  himself  worthy  to  be  called  a  follower 
of  his  heuristic  master,  Socrates.  The  heuristic 
question  in  simple  form  can  be  used  with  the 
lower  grades,  but  its  finest  fruits  appear  only 
with  the  adolescent  and  mature  mind. 

For  illustrations  of  the  heuristic  question, 
the  lists  of  questions  at  the  end  of  this  and 
the  other  chapters  may  be  used.  The  mugtra- 
first  list  in  each  case  refers  to  the  text,  *^°^^ 
and  the  second  list,  more  advanced  in  char- 
acter, refers  to  material  beyond  the  text. 
Some  heuristic  questions  on  Lincoln's  Gettys- 
burg Oration,  with  which  every  teacher  is 
familiar,  would  be  as  follows: 

At  the  time  Lincoln  spoke,  how  old  was  the  American 
Republic  ? 

To  what  proposition  was  it  dedicated  at  birth  ? 


74  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

Of  what  did  he  say  the  Civil  War  was  a  test  ? 
What  does  he  say  was  the  occasion  of  the  gathering  to 
which  he  spoke  ? 

Why  could  they  not  consecrate  that  ground  ? 

What  then  should  they  do  ? 

For  what  purpose  should  they  dedicate  themselves  ? 

Heuristic  questions  of  a  more  advanced  char- 
acter, going  beyond  the  letter  of  the  Oration, 
would  be  as  follows : 

Upon  what  occasion  was  this  Oration  delivered  ? 

Who  had  just  spoken  ? 

What  in  the  address  itself  shows  Lincoln  was  not  aware 
he  was  speaking  immortal  words  ? 

What  is  the  metaphor  in  the  first  sentence? 

In  what  sense  is  it  true  that  "all  men  are  created 
equal"? 

Try  to  arrange  the  Oration  as  blank  verse  (see  Literary 
Digest,  ¥eh.  26,  1916). 

How  would  you  characterize  the  style  of  this  Oration  ? 

Whence  did  Lincoln  acquire  such  style  ? 

What  are  some  antecedents  of  the  phrase:  "Govern- 
ment of  the  people,  by  the  people,  for  the  people  "  ? 

Memorize  the  Oration  and  try  to  deliver  it  as  you  fancy 
Lincoln  did. 

The  third  kind  of  question  is  the  one  used  in 
review.     The  character   of   the   ques- 

Review       tions  asked  in  review  should  depend  on 

Question        ,  i?  4.u  • 

the  purposes  oi  the  review. 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  75 

Secondary,  but  real,  purposes  of  the  review 
are  to  memorize  by  repetition  and  to  drill. 
This  type  of  review  is  necessary,  be- 

Secondary 

cause  we  do  not  really  know  a  thing  Purposes 

.    „      „  of  Review 

until  we  have  learned  it,  partially  for- 
gotten it,  and  learned  it  again.  Questions 
securing  this  result  will  be  short,  sharp,  quick. 
Examples  would  be,  in  grade  work,  ''Who 
discovered  America.^"  "When?"  "Where 
did  he  first  land?"  "For  what  was  he  really 
looking?"  "To  what  nationality  did  he  be- 
long?" "Whence  did  he  sail?"  "Why  from 
there?"  etc.  The  lower  grades  will  rely  mainly 
on  such  questions. 

But  the  primary  purposes  of  the  review  are 
to  give  perspective  and  organization  to  knowl- 
edge.    Perspective    in    a    subject    in-  primary 
volves  the  larger  view  that  comes  with  of^Jhe^^^ 
the  review,  and  organization  of  knowl-  R®^*^^ 
edge    involves    logical    relationships    between 
essentials   and   details.     In   historical   subjects 
a  great  aid  to  perspective  is  continuity  and  in 
all  subjects  the  great  aid   to  organization  of 
knowledge  is  some  unifying  principle.     Thus, 


76  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

in  reviewing  the  geography  of  a  continent,  the 
central  question  might  be:  ''What  is  the  in- 
niustra-  fluence  on  the  people  of  this  conti- 
tions  nent   of    the   following    features,    viz. 

climate,  mountains,  rivers,  oceans,  plains,  forests, 
fertility  of  the  soil,  etc.  ?"  Likewise,  in  review- 
ing the  literature  of  a  given  period  of  a  certain 
people,  the  central  question  would  be,  "How 
is  the  life  of  the  people  reflected  in  the  follow- 
ing types  of  their  literature,  viz.  ballad,  trag- 
edy, comedy,  lyrics,  epics,  satire,  fiction,  etc.?" 
Likewise  in  reviewing  the  history  of  a  given 
epoch,  the  perspective  and  organization  of 
knowledge  might  be  secured  by  some  such 
central  question  as,  "How  was  the  develop- 
ment of  the  individual  affected  in  this  period 
by  the  art  of  agriculture,  factories,  commerce, 
education,  form  of  government,  religion,  etc.?" 
This  type  of  unifying  review  questions  meets 
the  first  purpose  of  a  review.  The  examples  of 
questions  just  given  would  belong  with  the 
upper  grades  and  the  secondary  schools. 

Such  review  questions  as  these  may  be  an- 
swered orally,  or  in  the  form  of  a  topical  outline. 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  77 

or  essay,  or  drama,  or  the  teacher  may  answer 
the  question  in  the  form  of  an  illustrated  story 
or  talk. 

In  making  a  review,  new  material  should 
not  be  included,  but  a  second  and  larger  view 
should  be  secured.  It  is  also  proper  to  make 
applications.  A  review  is  ordinarily  desirable 
for  both  younger  and  older  pupils,  especially  in 
the  subjects  involving  many  facts  and  details. 
Vitalized  teachers  dealing  with  mature  students 
may  find  that  a  review  is  unnecessary,  detract- 
ing from  the  freshness  and  enjoyment  of  the 
first  view  of  the  field.  In  such  cases  it  is  im- 
portant that  the  examinational  question  serve 
the  purpose  of  unifying  the  subject. 

The    examinational    question,    as    its    name 
implies,  is  one  that  seeks  to  test  past  instruc- 
tion and  present  ability.     It  comes  at  j^^ 
the  end  of  a  course,  and  its  results  ^^^^ 
often  serve  as  a  basis  for  promotion.  Question 
It  may  be  either  oral  or  written.     Too  much 
of  our  teaching  is  really  examining  results  of 
pupils'  work  rather  than  working  out  results 
with  pupils.     And  too  much  of  our  final  exam- 


78  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

ination  tests  the  mental  function  of  memory 
rather  than  that  of  judgment.  The  exami- 
national question  serves  two  indispensable  edu- 
cative purposes,  —  one,  the  organization  of 
knowledge,  and,  the  other,  the  application  of 
knowledge.  Pupils  should  know  in  advance 
that  the  examination  will  test  their  ability  to 
see  the  material  whole,  to  institute  comparisons, 
and  to  make  application  of  principles  to  new 
situations.  To  get  the  best  results  from  an 
examination,  pupils  should  know  in  advance 
it  is  coming.  It  is  not  wise  to  use  the  exami- 
nation as  a  threat  to  secure  better  daily  work, 
which  serves  to  increase  the  pupils'  distaste  for 
examination.  Teachers  should  do  what  they 
can  to  decrease  any  nervous  strain  due  to  ex- 
aminations. To  omit  them  altogether,  on  the 
basis  of  a  high  daily  average  or  otherwise,  is 
not  to  be  commended,  because  in  no  other  way 
can  pupils  be  brought  so  well  to  the  organic 
view  of  their  subject  and  of  knowledge.  An 
examination  properly  given  is  not  "'a  scare- 
crow in  the  garden  of  wisdom,"  but  an  oppor- 
tunity   for    intellectual    self-expression,    not    a 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  79 

necessary  evil  but  an  important  good,  and  as 
such  should  be  anticipated  with  the  joy  of  the 
strong  man  in  the  race. 

In  illustration  of  these  points  of  view  I  will 
append  a  copy  of  one  of  my  own  examinations 
given   to   college   men   which    evoked  juugtra- 
no  protest  and  which  was  based  on  a  ^^^^ 
text  known  to  some  of  my  readers,  my  "Psy- 
chological Principles  of  Education." 

SECOND    SEMESTER,    1908-1909 

EDUCATION  4 

1.  In  view  of  the  results  of  this  course,  in  what  sense, 
if  any,  is  educating  a  science  ? 

2.  What  has  practical  psychology  led  you  to  plan  to  do 
in  your  work  ? 

3.  State   just  what  psychological   effects  upon  your 
pupils  you  expect  your  subject  to  have. 

4.  In  what  ways  does  the  mind  get  knowledge  ? 

5.  State  the  principles  in  educating  the  feelings  and 
apply  them  to  three  selected  instances. 

6.  Name  as  many  of  the  instincts  of  children  as  you 
can  and  show  the  way  to  treat  each. 

7.  Discuss  three  hindrances  to  attention,  showing  how 
they  may  be  removed. 

8.  Describe  the  development  and  training  of  the  reli- 
gious nature  in  youth. 

Dartmouth  College. 


80  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

Having  now  seen  the  kinds  of  question  that 
may  be  asked,  we  turn  next  to  the  manner  of 
The  Man-  their  asking.  The  heart  of  the  matter 
O^uestion-  ^^^^  ^^  ^^^^  questions  should  be  asked 
"^  by  the  teacher  with  great  sympathy 

for  the  pupil,  with  confidence  in  his  ability 
to  answer,  with  expectation  that  he  will  an- 
With  swer,  with  surprise  when  he  does  not 

Sympathy  answer,  with  interest  in  his  answer,  and 
^th  particular  attention  to  his  answer.  By 
such  a  manner  in  questioning  the  pupil  is  to 
be  encouraged  to  do  his  best;  his  spontaneity 
is  not  to  be  frozen  by  the  evident  coldness  of 
an  inquisitor,  by  the  haughty  demeanor  that 
seeks  in  questioning  the  assurance  of  a  sus- 
picion that  the  answerer  knows  little  of  what  he 
is  saying. 

A  further  matter  of  simple  detail  is  the  ad- 
visability of  stating  your  question  to  the  class 
as  a  whole  and  then  naming  the  pupil 

The  Ques-  ^  &  i-    i- 

tion  before  who  is  to  answer.     The  advantage  of 

the  Pupil 

this  order  is  that  all  the  pupils  think 
the  answer  before  any  one  is  called  upon  to 
give  it.     The  disadvantage  of  naming  the  pupil 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  81 

before  stating  the  question  is  that  the  other 
pupils  are  then  less  likely  to  give  attention, 
since  after  all  the  question  is  not  addressed  to 
them. 

Further  it  is  desirable  that  pupils  be  called 
upon  in  no  regular  predictable  order,  thus 
keeping  the  whole  class,   even   those 

NoPredict- 

who  have  already  recited,  on  the  qui  able  Order 

of  Pupils 

vive  all  the  time.     To  call  upon  pupils 
alphabetically,  or  according  to  their  seating,  is 
to  extend  an  implicit  invitation  to  inattention 
to  certain  members  of  the  class. 

Again,  questions  should  not  be  repeated, 
without  good  reason.  This  means,  of  course, 
they  should  be  well  asked  in  the  first  in- 
stance. To  repeat  a  question  on  request 
from  an  inattentive  pupil  is  to  re-  g^t  little 
ward  inattention.  Likewise,  teachers  Repetition 
should  not  repeat  the  correct  answers  of  the 
reciting  pupil,  for  the  attention  of  the  class 
should  be  given  to  the  answers  as  well  as 
to  the  questions;  besides  much  time  is 
thereby  saved;  furthermore,  it  is  irritating 
to    good    pupils    to    have    their    answers    re- 


82  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

peated,  slightly  modified,  as  though  corrected, 
by  the  teacher. 

It  is  also  well  to  ask  questions  deliberately, 
thinking  of  the  question  and  its  correct  answer 
WithDe-  yourself,  and  allowing  a  slight  pause 
liberation  ^^^^^  putting  it  before  calling  for  the 
answer.  Such  a  sedate  process  invites  think- 
ing ;  it  also  does  not  throw  a  pupil  off  his  mental 
balance  through  the  surprise  of  hearing  his 
name  called;  and  it  lends  dignity  to  the  pro- 
cedure. Of  course,  in  review  and  drill  questions 
considerable  speed  may  be  attained. 

We  are  sometimes  puzzled  to  handle  aright 
a  general,  advanced  question  we  want  to  ask. 
General  Such  questions  have  a  place  in  the 
Specific  classroom  as  suggesting  more  beyond. 
Questions  g^g  indicating  that  the  teacher  teaches 
the  truth  and  not  the  text.  Such  general 
questions  should  be  asked  of  the  class  as  a 
whole,  in  contrast  with  specific  questions  on 
the  lesson  assigned,  which  should  always  be 
asked  of  individuals.  The  reasons  for  this 
procedure  will  appear  on  reflection.  Being 
asked  of  the  whole  class,  a  wrong  answer  from 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  83 

a  volunteer  is  no  discredit,  while  the  correct 
answer  is  a  distinct  credit.  To  ask  such  a 
diflBcult  question,  to  which  you  have  not  the 
right  to  expect  the  answer,  of  an  individual 
takes  an  unfair  advantage.  On  the  other  hand, 
to  ask  specific  questions,  to  which  each  one 
should  be  able  to  respond,  of  the  class  as  a 
whole  is  to  lower  the  tone  of  the  teaching,  is  to 
let  off  the  slow  ones  too  easily,  is  to  encourage 
the  bright  ones  overmuch.  Questions  then  to 
which  you  have  the  right  to  expect  an  answer 
should  be  asked  of  individuals ;  those  to  which 
you  have  no  such  right  should  be  addressed 
to  the  whole  class. 

Lest  these  and  other  suggestions  to  follow 
be  taken  too  rigidly,  let  me  add  that  the  man- 
ner of  our  questioning,  however  good, 

Variety 

should  be  varied  from  time  to  time, 

that  a  virtue  become  not  wearisome  through 

monotony.     Little  surprises  to  the  class,   due 

to  the  teacher's  versatility  and  ingenuity,  are 

very    grateful,    and    they    may    appear    in    the 

teacher's  dress,  speech,  demeanor,  or  manner  of 

teaching. 


84  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

As  form  apart  from  content  is  an  abstrac- 
tion,   some    of    the    formal    characteristics    of 
questions  now  to  be  considered  may 

The  Fonn 

of  the         trespass  upon  the  succeeding  phase  of 

Question  ,.  . 

our   discussion   which   deals   with   the 

content  of  questions.     This  is  especially  true  of 

the  first  characteristic  of  the  form  of  questions, 

which  is  clearness. 

Questions  should  be  clear.     This  is  perhaps 

the  most  obvious  of  all  demands  upon  the  art 

of  right  questioning.  It  means  that 
Clearness 

teachers  think  out  their  main  ques- 
tions before  asking  them,  that  they  be  ac- 
quainted with  the  apperceptive  powers  of  their 
pupils,  that  they  reject  unusual  words  needing 
definition  in  framing  their  questions,  and  that 
they  eschew  all  intention  to  befuddle  and  con- 
fuse the  minds  of  their  students.  Even  then 
some  questions  will  not  be  clear  to  some 
pupils,  but  for  this  the  teacher  is  not  alone 
responsible. 

Closely  involved  in  clearness  is  brevity. 
Questions  should  be  brief.  All  parenthetical 
explanations  and  subordinate  clauses  may  well 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  85 

be  omitted,  as  well  as  repeated  efforts  to 
state  the  question.  The  fewer  the  words 
that  call  for  what  you  want  to  know, 

Brevity 

the  better.  In  this  connection  it 
may  be  remarked  that  two  distinct  questions 
had  better  not  be  asked  in  one,  as  tending  to 
unclear  thinking.  Both  clearness  and  brevity 
are  more  easily  secured  if  the  teacher  thinks 
clearly  himself  and  knows  what  he  wants  to  ask. 
Further,  questions  should  be  couched  in  as 
good  English  as  the  teacher  can  command. 
The  same  is  true  not  only  of  questions  ^^^^ 
but  of  aU  one's  teaching.  The  temp-  ^^^Ush 
tation  is  strong  upon  some  teachers  to  make 
themselves  intelligible  by  resorting  to  the  familiar 
slang  of  the  day,  whereas  for  their  pupils' 
sake  they  should  draw  only  from  the  well  of 
English  undefiled.  Let  your  questions  be  your 
own  questions,  not  drawn  from  any  printed 
page,  unless  you  are  as  fully  their  master  as 
though  you  had  framed  them  yourself.  In 
this  way  the  question  is  the  outgo  of  the 
teacher  as  truly  as  it  calls  for  the  outgo  of 
the  pupil. 


86  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

For  the  most  part,  avoid  questions  calling 
only  for  a  "y^s"  or  "no"  answer.  Such  an- 
The  swers  as  a  rule  do  not  demand  enough 

an/" No"  thinking,  the  chances  are  too  great  in 
Answer  favor  of  a  guess,  and  no  training  is  se- 
cured in  connected  discourse.  The  permissible 
questions  with  these  short  affirmative  or  nega- 
tive answers  are  such  as  really  require  think- 
ing before  the  answer  is  given,  and  so  lead  the 
way  to  the  question  "Why.?^" 

And  lastly,  the  form  of  the  question  should 

not  suggest  the  answer.     The  question  should 

stand   upright    and   not   lean   toward 

No  "Lead-     . 

ing  either  the  correct  or  the  incorrect  an- 

Question  " 

swer.  It  is  very  easy  for  the  teacher 
to  suggest  by  facial  expression  as  well  as  by  the 
form  of  the  question  whether  the  pupil  is  on 
the  right  tack  or  not.  In  the  direct  examina- 
tion of  a  witness  no  lawyer  is  permitted  by  the 
rules  of  evidence  to  ask  a  ''leading"  question, 
that  is,  one  that  suggests  the  answer  wanted. 
Only  in  the  cross-examination  of  witnesses  is 
this  form  of  question  permissible.  But  the 
motives  of  a  cross-examination  have  no  place 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  87 

in  the  regular  classroom  work;  it  may  have  a 
place  in  the  principal's  office  in  a  case  of  dis- 
cipline. In  the  heuristic  question  we  should 
avoid  leading  the  pupil  to  the  correct  answer 
as  we  should  misleading  him  to  the  wrong 
answer.  Likewise  the  "catch"  question  is  to 
be  eschewed,  unless  it  is  announced  as  such, 
when  it  loses  its  edge;  otherwise  the  pupil 
caught  by  it  is  sure  to  feel  himself  not  fairly 
treated.  The  teacher  dealing  with  a  pupil 
answering  out  of  the  fulness  of  his  ignorance  as 
though  he  knew  can  silence  him  and  convince  him 
of  his  ignorance  by  straight  questioning,  without 
resorting  to  the  game  of  ''catch"  or  misleading 
questions,  and  the  effect  will  be  better.  It  is 
never  safe  to  set  a  trap  for  a  pupil  lest  he  en- 
snare you  before  the  class  by  exposing  it.  You 
are  not  to  win  a  victory  over  him,  but  you  and 
he  are  to  win  a  joint  victory  over  ignorance. 
In  one  sense  a  question  has  no  content ;    it 

is  a  form  of  speech  that  calls  for   a 

The  Con- 
content.     Thus  really  the  answer  is  the  tent  of  the 

^       .        ,.        Question 

content  oi   the  question.      So  m  dis- 
cussing   the   content    of    the   question   we   are 


88  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

discussing  its  characteristics  as  best  adapted 
to  elicit  good  answering. 

First  of  all,  a  question  should  be  stimulating, 
interesting,  suggestive.  It  should  awaken  a 
stimulat-  train  of  associated  ideas,  and  prove 
^  thus  to  be  an  incentive  to  intelligent 

response.  This  is  more  likely  to  be  the  case 
with  the  bright  pupils  than  with  the  dull  ones 
and  so  it  is  a  peculiar  victory  to  be  able  to  ask 
questions  that  stimulate  dull  pupils. 

Second,   questions  should  be  definite;    that 

is,  they  should  call  for  a  specific  answer,  they 

should   not  be  vague,  and  not  cover 

Definite  ... 

too  much  ground.     A  question  is  like 

an  arrow  aimed  at  a  target;  there  is  only  one 
way  to  hit  the  bull's-eye,  there  are  a  thousand 
ways  of  missing  it.  The  pupil  who  has  care- 
fully prepared  the  work  assigned  rejoices  in  a 
definite  question,  finding  a  vague  one  unfair 
to  his  preparation,  but  a  pupil  who  has  only  a 
smattering  acquaintance  with  the  lesson  finds 
an  indefinite  question  preferable. 

Third,  questions  should  be  essential  in  char- 
acter;   that  is,  they  should  call  out  the  main 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  89 

points  in  the  lesson,  omitting  the  non-essentials. 
Any  text-book  is  like  a  picture,  with  foreground 
and    background,    the    latter    existing 

Essential 

for  the  sake  of  the  former.  The 
question  should  put  into  the  foreground  the 
essentials  of  the  assignment,  leaving  the  non- 
essentials in  the  background.  To  ask  questions 
in  this  way  means  analysis  of  the  lesson  and  a 
judgment  of  values  upon  the  part  of  the  teacher, 
and  it  also  encourages  pupils  to  stress  the  main 
points  and  to  estimate  which  they  are.  Further- 
more, the  aesthetic  sense  of  proportion  is  pleased 
at  such  nice  adjustment  of  question  and  lesson. 

Most  teachers  ask  too  many  questions.  It 
not  infrequently  happens  that  a  single  class 
exercise  includes  over  a  hundred  questions. 
Such  comminuted  bits  of  knowledge  destroy  the 
perspective  between  essential  and  non-essential 
elements  in  a  lesson,  besides  training  the  pupil 
in  disconnected  thinking  and  discourse.  Ask 
fewer  questions  and  broaden  their  scope. 

Fourth,  questions  should  be  logical;  that  is, 
an  inherent  connection  should  exist  between 
successive  questions,  just  as  there  is  an  inherent 


90  THREE  SCHOOL  AETS 

connection  in  a  well-composed  text.  The  ques- 
tions thus  should  grow  out  of  each  other,  and 

so  the  whole  subject  should  gradually 
Logical 

be  unfolded.     Frequently   the   answer 

of  a  pupil  will  be  the  best  clew  to  the  next 
question.  In  any  case  continuity  in  the  pres- 
entation should  appear.  Toward  the  end  of 
the  lesson  unifying  questions  should  be  asked 
that  gather  the  essence  of  the  whole  into  one 
or  two  answers,  leading  to  an  intellectual 
vision  of  the  whole  truth  in  question,  and  mak- 
ing applications  of  truth  to  life  easy. 

Fifth,  questions  should  not  simply  test  the 
memory  but  also  exercise  the  judgment.  It  is 
Thought-  ^^^y  ^^  ^^^  questions  whose  answers 
provoking  jj^ayg  been  learned  from  a  text;  it  is 
not  easy  to  ask  questions  that  involve  think- 
ing, the  application  of  what  has  been  learned 
to  a  new  situation.  Yet  it  is  this  type  of  ques- 
tion that  distinguishes  the  rote  learner  and 
teacher  from  the  flexible  type.  Equipment  for 
success  in  life  is  not  only  memory,  but  also,  and 
especially,  judgment.  Memory  makes  good  fol- 
lowers, but  judgment  is  essential  for  leadership. 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  91 

Sixth,  questions  should  be  suited  to  the 
capacity  of  the  pupil  questioned.  This  means 
that  teachers  should  know  the  capac- 

Suitedto 

ities  of  their  pupils,  and  not  have  so  individual 

.,     .  ,  ,  Capacity 

many  pupils  m  one  room  that  they  can- 
not make  an  individual  study  of  them.  Gra- 
dation supposedly  puts  pupils  of  practically 
the  same  capacity  together;  but  even  so,  va- 
riations appear  in  the  same  classroom.  Each 
pupil  should  be  asked  questions  that  take  him 
where  he  is  and  lead  him  on.  To  ask  questions 
beyond  capacity  is  discouraging,  to  ask  ques- 
tions below  capacity  is  belittling,  but  to  ask 
questions   just   within   capacity   is   developing. 

The  teacher  as  questioner,  —  what  ought  his 
characteristics  to  be?     A  few  of  these  ^^ 
have   already   been   intimated   in   the  Q*»«stioner 
preceding  discussion. 

First  of  all,  the  questioner  must  be  indus- 
trious enough  to  prepare  some  at  least  of  his 
questions  in  advance,  even  to  the  point  prepare  in 
of  writing  down  a  few  main  ones.  Not  Advance 
all  questions  should  have  been  first  prepared, 
nor  should  one  be  rigidly  bound  by  his  own 


92  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

preparation,  but  the  fact  of  having  prepared 
will  itself  improve  the  quality  of  his  spontaneous 
questions.  The  very  best  question  will  prob- 
ably not  have  been  thought  of  in  advance,  but 
will  be  called  out  by  the  needs  of  the  occasion. 
The  teacher  should  attend  carefully  to  the 
pupil's  answer,  which  often  is  the  clew  to  the 
best  question  to  ask  next. 

Secondly,    in    order    to    question    well,    the 

teacher   must   cultivate   an   analytic   habit   of 

mind.     It  is  a  good  plan  to  annotate 

Analytic 

the  margins  of  one's  own  book  with  the 
essential  thoughts  in  each  paragraph,  unless  the 
author  of  the  text  has  himself  already  done  so. 
To  analyze  a  lesson  into  its  essential  points  is 
the  first  step  toward  formulating  the  best 
questions  on  it. 

Thirdly,    the    teacher    should    be    practical- 
minded  enough  to  ask  questions  that  make  a 

difference;  that  is,  he  should  teach 
Practical 

from  life  for  life.     There  is  but  little 

place  in  the  schoolroom  for  the  merely  academic 

question,  that  is,  for  the  question  whose  answer 

changes  no  act,  feeling,  or  thought.     The  time 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  93 

has  gone  by  when  the  schoolmaster  was  the 
sharpener  of  wits  on  questions  admitting  of 
dubious,  difficult  answers,  or  none  at  all.  The 
early  Middle  Age  teachers  of  great  renown  were 
fond  of  such  unpractical  wit-sharpeners  as, 
How  many  furrows  has  a  farmer  ploughed  when 
he  has  turned  three  times  at  each  side  of  his 
field  ?  or.  Find  three  odd  whole  numbers  whose 
sum  equals  three  hundred?  or.  Can  angels  go 
from  place  to  place  without  traversing  the 
intervening  space?  To  the  first  of  these  three 
the  Venerable  Bede  and  the  great  Alcuin  gave 
different  answers.  It  is  true  that  such  puzzles 
interest  the  mind;  they  had  more  place  in  a 
time  when  the  human  mind  was  bent,  not  on 
exploration  and  discovery,  but  on  whetting  its 
powers,  —  "oc?  acuendos  juvenes,*'  said  Alcuin. 
Fourthly,  the  questioner  should  be  capable 
of  eliciting  the  best  from  his  answer ;  this  means 
he  must  be  encouraging,  attentive,  EUcitthe 
interested,  sympathetic,  confidence-  ^®^* 
inspiring.  To  be  so  is  to  call  forth  the  best 
efforts  of  the  respondent.  The  pupil's  answer 
should  be  treated  as  important,  —  it  is  to  him. 


94  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

No  doubt  of  his  ability  to  answer  should  be 
suggested.  His  sense  of  power  in  getting  and 
expressing  his  ideas  is  cultivated  through  your 
appreciative  recognition  of  his  efforts.  Never 
laugh  at  a  pupil,  though  you  should  often  laugh 
with  him.  Never  be  contemptuous  of  a  pupil's 
ignorance  or  half-formed  opinions,  unless  you 
would  repel  him.  Treat  each  pupil  under  your 
questioning,  not  as  a  target  under  fire,  but  as  a 
plant  under  cultivation;  you  do  not  so  much 
hear  him  recite  as  see  him  grow. 

Fifthly,  be  as  ready  to  answer  questions  as 
to  ask  them.  There  is  a  certain  inherent  arti- 
Be  Ready  fi^iality  in  schoolroom  questioning ;  on 
to  Answer  ^^  street,  the  man  who  questions 
wants  to  find  out  something  he  does  not  know, 
which  his  informant  tells  him;  but  in  the 
schoolroom  the  teacher  who  is  supposed  to 
know  already  does  the  questioning.  It  would 
be  less  artificial  if  the  pupils  did  the  question- 
ing and  the  teacher  the  answering.  The  highest 
compliment  to  a  teacher  as  questioner  is  that 
his  pupils  ask  him  questions,  not  questions  to 
kill  time,  but  because  they  want  to  know.     The 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  95 

dangers  in  using  this  method  exclusively  are 
that  some  pupils  are  likely  to  be  neglected  and 
the  subject  is  presented  in  a  haphazard  fashion. 
But  every  pupil  should  feel  free  to  ask  the 
teacher  a  question  that  concerns  him.  This 
means  of  course  that  the  teacher  will  at  times 
have  to  confess  ignorance,  which  will  in  the  end 
do  his  soul  good;  also  that  he  must  "profess" 
nothing  which  he  does  not  possess.  For  the 
teacher  to  take  the  attitude  that  he  is  there  to 
question,  not  to  be  questioned,  is  a  travesty  on 
the  true  teaching  which  awakes,  not  narcotizes, 
intelligence.  Growing  minds  are  instinctively 
curious,  if  we  give  them  half  a  chance  to  be  so. 
Pupils  should  not  only  feel  free  to  ask  a  question 
when  they  have  one,  they  should  also  at  times 
be  allowed  to  set  questions  for  each  other,  thus 
taking  the  teacher's  point  of  view,  and  coming 
to  study  from  another  angle  and  interest.  In 
giving  advice  to  the  teacher  of  rhetoric,  Quin- 
tilian  ^  says:  "Let  him  reply  readily  to  those 
who  put  questions  to  him,  and  question  of  his 
own  accord  those  who  do." 

>  Institutes  of  Oratory,  Bk.  II,  Chap.  U. 


96  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

Rousseau  writes : 

Be  content,  then,  with  presenting  to  him  suitable 
objects ;  and  then,  when  you  see  his  curiosity  sufficiently 
excited,  address  to  him  some  laconic  question  which  will 
put  him  in  the  way  of  resolving  it.  .  .  .  If  he  asks  you 
questions,  reply  just  enough  to  stimulate  his  curiosity, 
but  not  enough  to  satisfy  it.  Above  all,  when  you  see 
that,  instead  of  asking  questions  for  instruction,  he  under- 
takes to  beat  the  bush  and  to  annoy  you  with  silly  ques- 
tions, stop  on  the  instant,  for  you  may  then  be  sure  that 
he  no  longer  cares  for  the  thing  itself,  but  merely  to  sub- 
ject you  to  his  interrogations.^ 

The  answers  given  to  pupils  by  the  teacher 
when  they  are  matters  of  opinion  and  not  mat- 
ters of  fact  should  be  undogmatic  in  character. 

Sixthly,  the  questioner  should  be  self -critical. 
When  he  feels  he  has  failed,  he  must  not  be 
Self-  downcast,  but  resolutely  and  manfully 

cnticai  g^j.  ^^  work  to  discover  the  reason  of 
the  failure,  that  he  may  remove  it.  He  must 
learn  to  question  by  questioning  and  also  by 
reflection  upon  his  questioning.  The  time  to 
examine  ourselves  is  as  early  after  the  failure 
as  possible,  while  its  details  are  in  mind.  It  is 
a  rare  friend  who  will  tell  us  frankly  our  faults, 

1  Rousseau,  Emile,  pp.  139,  145  (Payne  Tr.). 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  97 

but  we  can  learn  from  ourselves,  if  vanity  do 
not  blind  us,  and  also  from  those  who  do  not 
like  us,  if  narrow-mindedness  prejudice  us  not. 
If  the  secret  of  your  failure  is  that  a  member  of 
your  class  does  not  like  you,  be  magnanimous 
enough  to  have  a  private  conference  with  him, 
and  end  by  requesting  a  favor  of  him  that  im- 
plies responsibility. 

Lastly,   let  us   study  the   literature  of  this 
subject.     Questioning     is     the     old     standard 
method  of   teaching;    as    such  it   has  study  the 
been  studied   by  educators  from  Soc-  ^l^^^^ 
rates  through  Abelard  till  to-day.     The  ^"^J®^* 
literature  of  the  subject  is  both  old  and  new, 
and   also   considerable.     If  we  would   improve 
ourselves  in  this  delicate  and  fine  art,  we  should 
draw  from  many  living  wells,  some  of  which  I 
have  indicated  at  the  conclusion  of  this  chapter. 

It  is  important  for  teachers  to  have  an  ideal 
of  the  kind  of  answer  they  want.     If  teachers 
are  satisfied  with  the  "It  says"  type  ^^ 
of  answer,  or  the  exact  words  of  the  ^^^^^ 
book,  then  the  pupils  tend  to  give  that  kind  of 
answer.     But  the  character  of  what  an  answer 


98  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

should  be  has  been  reflected  by  our  discussion 
of  the  character  of  the  question. 

There  are  three  main  desirable  characteristics 
of  the  answer.  The  first  is,  that  it  be  the  product 
The  Pupu's  ^^  ^^^  pupil's  best  mental  reaction  upon 
^®^*  the  question,  his  own  individual  reaction, 

with  the  outgoing  of  his  personality  behind  it. 

The  second  is,  that,  like  the  question,  the 
answer  should  be  couched  in  good  English. 
qqq^j  The  slang  of  the  street,  or  incorrect 

EngUsh  grammar,  or  a  mispronunciation  should 
not  be  allowed  to  pass  uncorrected  in  any  class- 
room. The  best  way  is  to  ask  the  pupil  to  try 
to  correct  the  mistake  in  form  himself.  The 
answer  should  usually  be  a  complete  statement, 
and  may  often  profitably  be  the  whole  story  of 
the  lesson.  The  teacher  has  triumphed  who 
can  bring  into  his  classroom  the  toleration  of  a 
long  answer  from  a  pupil. 

The  third  is,  the  answer  should  be  correct 

as  far  as  it  goes,  for  the  sake  of  knowledge.     A 

correct  answer  need  not  be  repeated 
Correct 

by  the  teacher,  though  it  may  be;    it 

may  sometimes  be  written  by  the  teacher  on 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  99 

the  board  or  by  the  pupils  in  their  note- 
books or  it  may  be  repeated  by  the  class  in 
chorus. 

To  secure  these  three  results  in  the  best  way, 
written  as  well  as  oral  answers  will  sometimes 
be  necessary.     A  written  answer  is  not 

Oral  and 

under  such  immediate  control  of  the  Written 

Answers 

teacher  as  the  oral  answer.  In  ad- 
vance of  a  written  test  it  is  well  to  instruct 
pupils  as  to  the  characteristics  you  desire  their 
answers  to  show.  Thus,  in  addition  to  the 
three  qualities  described  above,  a  written  an- 
swer should  correctly  interpret  the  question 
asked,  should  show  good  arrangement  of  mate- 
rial, and  should  include  no  irrelevant  filling. 
These  results  can  be  secured  by  a  judicious  and 
leisurely  reaction  upon  the  question  and  by 
ordering  one's  answer  in  one's  own  mind  before 
beginning  to  write. 

In  the  conduct  of  the  recitation,  how  shall 
we  handle  the  well-intentioned  incor- 

.'  The 

rect  answer  r     Recognize  any  good  you  incorrect 

Answer 

can  find  in  it  and  then  pass  the  ques- 
tion to  another  pupil.     It  sometimes  hurts  the 


100  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

pride  of  a  good  scholar  to  have  a  question  passed 
on,  but  to  pass  it  on  nevertheless  stimulates  his 
effort  in  his  next  answer. 

Certain  types  of  answer  should  be  distinctly- 
discouraged  and  rejected,  such  as  the  random, 
careless,    hasty,    and    guessing    types. 

Answers  to 

be  Dis-       and,  of  course,  m  any  form  in  which  it 

courage d 

may  appear,  the  dishonest  type.  If 
it  is  evident  no  member  of  the  class  knows  the 
correct  answer,  the  pupils  may  be  told  where 
they  can  find  it,  or  the  answer  to  a  difiicult 
question  may  be  given  outright.  Teachers 
should  not  avoid  the  confession  of  ignorance  by 
the  subterfuge  of  telling  pupils  in  a  vague  way  : 
"that  would  be  a  good  thing  to  look  up."  It 
is  important  that  teachers  be  sincere  and  that 
pupils  come  to  feel  the  mystery  of  the  world 
through  the  inability  of  the  teacher  or  anybody 
to  answer  some  questions. 

The  answer  of  the  pupil  as  the  expression 
of  his  life  and  thought  the  true  teacher  espe- 
cially regards  and  studies;  it  is  one  of  the 
real  measures  of  the  degree  of  our  success  as 
teachers. 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTlOraN&  ioi 

Not  as  reflecting  any  discredit  on  the  pupils, 
but  as  revealing  weaknesses  in  our  own  teach- 
ing,   let    us    consider    the    humorous  Natural 
confusion    in    the    following    answers  p^s*^"^ 
of  high  school  pupils  to  questions  on  ^^wers 
the  New   York   State   Regents'   examinations : 

"A  vacuum  is  a  large  empty  space  where  the  Pope  lives." 
"Pompeii  was  destroyed  by  an  eruption  of  saliva.'* 
"Typhoid  fever  may  be  prevented  by  fascination." 
"Silas  Marner  was  written  by  Maxine  Eliot." 
"Three  members  of  the  cat  family  are  Papa   Cat, 
Mamma  Cat,  and  Baby  Cat." 

"Georgia  was  founded  by  people  who  had  been  exe- 
cuted." 

"Two  compound  personal  pronouns  are  he-goat  and 
she-devil." 

"A  mountain  pass  is  a  pass  given  by  railroads  to  their 
employees  so  they  can  spend  their  vacations  in  the  moun- 
tains." 

"Dew  is  caused  by  the  swetting  of  the  earth." 
"The  nails  would  get  very  long  if  we  did  not  bite  them 
occasionally." 

"The  stomach  forms  a  part  of  the  Adam's  apple." 
"  Sanitary  suggestions  for  milking :  If  a  cow  switches  his 
tail,  it  may  hit  a  bacteria  and  knock  it  into  the  milk  pail." 
"Dikes  are  made  of  rocks  and  cement,  or,  in  cases  of 
immediate  danger,  of  bags  of  dirt,  or  even  the  people  have 
huddled  together  to  keep  the  water  from  entering  Louisi- 
ana." 


102  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

"The  approximate  annual  rainfall  of  New  York  is 
mostly  in  the  spring." 

"How  a  knowledge  of  Biology  aids  in  prmiing  a  tree : 
After  pruning  a  tree,  clean  the  dust  out  of  the  pores  and 
allow  the  tree  to  grow  prunes  again." 

"The  hair  keeps  things  from  going  into  the  brain." 

"Permanent  set  of  teeth  consists  of  eight  canines,  eight 
cuspids,  two  molars,  and  four  cuspidors." 

"The  cause  of  indigestion  is  trying  to  make  a  square 
meal  fit  a  round  stomach." 

"Insects  may  be  destroyed  late  at  night  by  pouring 
Paris  Green  on  them.  This  is  the  time  when  they  are  at 
home." 

"The  alimentary  canal  is  in  the  northern  part  of 
Indiana." 

"The  most  interesting  book  I  read  was  the  Bible.  It 
was  about  the  life  of  our  Lord.  It  was  written  by  Arch- 
bishop McCloskey." 

"Sixty  gallons  make  one  hedge  hog." 

Among  the  things  shown  by  these  answers 
are:  imagination,  lack  of  definite  knowledge, 
lack  of  observation  based  on  experience,  con- 
fusion of  words  similar  in  sound,  misleading 
associations,  and  reliance  too  exclusively  on 
oral  instruction.  Such  mistakes  are  not  only 
amusing,  they  are,  or  should  be,  instructive 
to  teachers.^ 

1  Cf.  "The  Mistakes  of  Professors,"  School  and  Society,  Vol.  I,  p.  132. 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  103 

By  way  of  bringing  this  long  discussion  to  a 
conclusion,  let  me  refer  to  certain  great  ques- 
tioners   as    illustrations.      From    out  ^^^^^ 
the  ancient  world,  let  us   select   Soc-  Questioners 
rates  and  Jesus,  both  preeminent   questioners. 

Socrates  has  great  fame  as  a  teacher,  and 

deservedly  so,  in  view  of  his  great  influence 

upon  Greek  thought  and  life.     As  a 

1         o  T  1  '11        Socrates 

teacher  Socrates  did  not  write  books, 

ironically  assumed  ignorance,  did  not  lecture, 
but  conversed,  and  "could  not  make  a  long 
speech,"  he  playfully  said.  So  his  fame  as  a 
teacher  rests  on  the  Socratic  method,  not  on 
his  outward  results,  and  the  main  element  in 
his  method  was  questioning,  which  in  his 
honor  has  come  to  be  called  "the  Socratic  art." 
For  illustrations  of  Socrates'  method  in  ask- 
ing questions  we  may  draw  upon  his  historically 
minded  pupil,  Xenophon,  who  reports  in  his 
Memorabilia  (IV,  7,  13) : 

Whenever  any  person  contradicted  him  on  any  point 
who  had  nothing  definite  to  say,  and  who  perhaps  asserted, 
without  proof,  that  some  person,  whom  he  mentioned,  was 
wiser,  or  better  skilled  in  political  affairs,  or  possessed  of 
greater  courage,  or  worthier  in  some  such  respect  [than 


104  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

some  one  whom  Socrates  had  mentioned],  he  would  recall 
the  whole  argument,  in  some  such  way  as  the  following,  to 
the  primary  proposition  :  "Do  you  say  that  he  whom  you 
commend  is  a  better  citizen  than  he  whom  I  commend  ?  " 
"  I  do  say  so."  "  Why  should  we  not  then  consider,  in  the 
first  place,  what  is  the  duty  of  a  good  citizen?**  "Let  us 
do  so . "  "  Would  he  not  then  be  superior  in  the  management 
of  the  public  money  who  should  make  the  state  richer  ? " 
"Undoubtedly."  "And  he  in  war  who  should  make  it 
victorious  over  its  enemies .?  "  "Assuredly."  "And  in  an 
embassy  he  who  should  make  friends  of  foes  ?  "  "  Doubt- 
less." "And  he  in  addressing  the  people  who  should  check 
dissension  and  inspire  them  with  unanimity  ^  "  "  I  think 
so."  When  the  discussion  was  thus  brought  back  to  fun- 
damental principles,  the  truth  was  made  evident  to  those 
who  had  opposed  him. 

Further  illustrations  may  be  found  in  the 
earlier  dialogues  of  Plato,  especially  in  the 
"Gorgias"  and  ''Protagoras." 

From  a  study  of  these  illustrations  we  will 
find  several  characteristics  of  the  questions 
asked  by  Socrates,  viz. : 

(1)  They  are  "leading"  questions  in  form,  — 
the  interlocutor  always  knew  the  answer  Soc- 
rates wanted  him  to  give,  though  he  was  not 
always  ready  to  give  it.  This  is  a  blemish  in 
the  art  of  this  great  master  of  teachers. 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  105 

(2)  They  are  based  on  concrete  data,  on 
illustrations  drawn  from  daily  Athenian  life, 
about  which  the  whole  company  of  listeners 
would  know.  Socrates  began  with  the  known, 
concrete,  empirical  percepts. 

(3)  They  call  for  a  definition  of  terms,  for 
the  formation  of  concepts,  for  a  generalization 
based  on  experience,  for  the  formulation  and 
establishment  of  a  principle.  Socrates  moved 
from  the  concrete  to  the  abstract,  the  concept, 
the  rational,  which  at  the  start  was  the  un- 
known. 

(4)  They  made  the  young  men  to  whom  they 
were  put  think  for  themselves  ;  the  dialogues  of 
Plato,  which  embody  these  questionings  of 
Socrates,  in  the  hands  of  a  skilful  teacher  or 
mature  reader  still  do  the  same.  Socrates  was 
a  developer  of  mentality  through  the  practice 
of  judgment  based  on  observation. 

(5)  They  were  logical  in  character,  following 
on  from  admitted  principles  to  new  and  often 
unwelcome  conclusions.  His  pupils  sometimes 
objected  to  being  led  by  insensible  degrees  into 
a  conclusion   inconsistent   with   the   views  ex- 


106  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

pressed  in  their  initial  ignorance.  But  Socrates 
never  laughed  at  them,  because  he  claimed  to 
be  removing  his  own  ignorance  also  by  the 
process. 

(6)  They  often  went  unanswered,  even  by 
Socrates  himself.  He  would  leave  them  to 
ferment  in  the  minds  of  his  pupils.  For  this 
reason  many  of  the  earlier  dialogues  of  Plato, 
which  are  just  Plato's  literary  expression  of 
a  Socratic  conversation,  end  negatively;  for 
example,  the  These tetus,  whose  question  is, 
What  is  knowledge  ?  But  Socrates  was  very 
ready  to  undertake  the  answer  of  any  question 
raised  by  an  auditor.  In  fact,  the  very  life  of 
Socrates  was  a  question-mark  in  the  presence 
of  his  fellows.  The  following  passage  will  show 
how  Plato's  literary  genius  clothes  this  fact. 

At  the  conclusion  of  the  Apology,  Plato 
represents  Socrates  as  considering  the  question 
whether   to   die   is   gain.     Socrates   continues : 

Above  all,  I  shall  then  [after  death]  be  able  to  continue 
my  search  into  true  and  false  knowledge,  as  in  this  world, 
so  also  in  that.  And  I  shall  find  out  who  is  wise,  and  who 
pretends  to  be  wise  and  is  not.  What  would  not  a  man 
give  to  be  able  to  examine  the  leader  of  the  Trojan  expedi- 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  107 

tion ;  or  Odysseus,  or  Sisyphus,  or  numberless  others  — 
men  and  women  too !  What  infinite  delight  would  there 
be  in  conversing  with  them  and  asking  questions !  —  in 
another  world  they  do  not  put  a  man  to  death  for  asking 
questions ;   assuredly  not.^ 

The  preserved  illustrations  of  the  questions 
asked  by  Jesus  are  to  be  found  in  the  four 
gospels  where  they  may  be  studied  with 

Jesus 
profound  profit  by  any  teacher.     Many 

of  them  are  in  our  minds  ah-eady,  only  we  have 
not  thought  to  inquire  as  to  their  character- 
istics, with  a  view  to  imitating  their  excellen- 
cies. When  we  do  so  inquire,  we  note  several 
similarities  between  the  questions  of  Jesus  and 
those  of  Socrates,  as  well  as  dissimilarities. 

(1)  Unlike  Socrates,  Jesus  did  not  employ 
the  leading  form  of  question.  He  stated  his 
question  in  an  unbiassed  way  and  left  the  mind 
of  his  hearer  to  react  independently  upon  it 
without  any  suggestion  as  to  the  correct  an- 
swer. For  example:  "Which  of  the  two  did 
the  will  of  his  father?"  In  this  respect  the 
questions  of  Jesus  are  superior  to  those  of 
Socrates. 

»  Plato,  Apology    (Jowett  Tr.). 


108  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

(2)  Like  those  of  Socrates,  the  questions  of 
Jesus  are  based  on  concrete  illustrations.  But 
in  the  case  of  Jesus  these  illustrations,  though 
drawn  from  the  experiences  of  simple  life,  are 
presented  in  those  consummate  word  pictures 
known  as  the  parables,  fashioned  in  the  work- 
shop of  an  artist's  soul.  For  example,  after 
the  parable  of  ''The  Good  Samaritan"  came  the 
question,  "Which  of  these  three,  thinkest  thou, 
proved  neighbor  unto  him  that  fell  among  the 
robbers?" 

(3)  Again,  like  Socrates,  Jesus  made  his 
pupils  think  by  means  of  his  questions.  He 
secured  self-expression  from  his  auditors,  as  a 
basis  for  further  assistance  from  him.  For 
example,  before  any  great  work  of  healing, 
''Believest  thou  that  I  am  able  to  do  this?" 
And  after  the  parable  of  "The  Vineyard," 
"When  therefore  the  lord  of  the  vineyard  shall 
come,  what  will  he  do  imto  those  husband- 
men?" 

(4)  Again,  like  Socrates,  Jesus  did  not  al- 
ways answer  his  own  questions,  but  left  them 
sticking  in  the  minds  of  his  hearers.     Some  of 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  109 

these  were  rhetorical  questions,  stronger  for 
being  unanswered;  for  example,  "Do  men 
gather  grapes  of  thorns,  or  figs  of  thistles?" 
One  of  these  questions  his  enemies  could  not 
answer  and  he  did  not,  viz.  "If  David  called 
him  lord,  how  is  he  his  son?"  By  the  way, 
what  is  the  answer  to  this  question  ? 

(5)  Again,  his  questions  were  very  practical ; 
they  were  aimed  at  the  control  of  conduct  and 
the  formation  of  character.  His  questions  are 
more  practical  than  those  of  Socrates.  Both 
of  these  superior  teachers  were  interested  more 
in  man  than  in  nature.  But  whereas  Socrates 
would  secure  virtue  mediately  by  way  of  knowl- 
edge, Jesus  would  secure  virtue  immediately 
by  way  of  feeling  and  will.  Socrates  empha- 
sized the  influence  of  ideas  on  conduct,  Jesus  the 
influence  of  conduct  on  ideas.  The  immediate 
aim  of  Socrates  was  a  new  type  of  think- 
ing, of  Jesus  a  new  type  of  living.  Illustra- 
tions of  questions  asked  by  Jesus  to  control 
conduct  are:  "Why  beholdest  thou  the  mote 
that  is  in  thy  brother's  eye,  but  considerest 
not   the   beam   in   thine   own   eye?"     "What 


no  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

shall  it  profit  a  man  if  he  gain  the  whole  world 
and  lose  his  own  soul?" 

(5)  Finally,  the  questions  of  Jesus  were  very- 
personal.  They  took  hold  of  the  reins  of  the 
individual  to  whom  they  were  addressed.  Soc- 
rates asked  of  Theodota  (Xenophon,  Memo- 
rabilia, 3,  11,  1,  seq,)  information  concerning 
her  art  of  enticing  lovers ;  Jesus  asked  of  the 
woman  of  Samaria  a  drink  of  water  to  quench 
his  thirst  that  he  might  awaken  her  soul  to  the 
higher  life.  His  was  a  very  personal  question 
to  the  lawyer,  "What  is  written  in  the  law, 
how  readest  thou.^^"  Likewise  it  was  a  very 
personal  question  he  addressed  to  his  disciples, 
"But  whom  say  ye  that  I  am.^" 

On  the  whole  it  is  small  wonder  that  the 
questions  of  Jesus  so  impressed  themselves 
upon  the  memory  of  his  hearers  that  they  could 
be  recalled  a  generation  later  and  written  down, 
that  he  impressed  them  as  one  having  authority, 
even  the  authority  of  personal  experience,  and 
that  he  seemed  to  them  to  speak  as  never  man 
spake.  A  newly  discovered  reputed  saying  of 
Jesus  is :    "They  who  question  shall  reign." 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  111 

From  many  modern  instances  that  might 
be  taken,  let  me  select  the  famous  one  of  Dr. 
Mark  Hopkins,  for  thirty-six  years  j^^^j^ 
president  of  Williams  College,  retiring  ^^p^^s 
in  1872.  Former  students  of  his  have  told  me 
he  was  a  famous  questioner  in  three  respects, 
viz.  (1)  keeping  the  unity  of  the  class  as  it 
thought  out  the  answers ;  (2)  keeping  the  unity 
of  the  subject  by  the  logical  arrangement 
of  his  questions;  and  (3)  stimulating  the 
thought  of  the  individual,  so  that  students 
would  continue  to  discuss  his  questions  after 
the  class  was  dismissed.  This  modern  instance 
particularly  may  encourage  us  all  to  strive  to 
be  great  questioners. 

A  skilful  lawyer  at  his  work  in  the  court- 
room may  show  us  many  things  about  ques- 
tioning ;  it  would  repay  us  as  teachers  ^^ 
to  visit  sessions  of  the  court,  in  order  ^*^®' 
to  study  human  nature  in  general  and  the  law- 
yer's method  of  questioning  in  particular. 
There  are  two  forms  of  questioning  used  by 
the  lawyer;  one,  the  direct  examination  of 
his   own   witnesses,    in   which   case    "leading" 


112  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

questions  are  barred  by  the  rules  of  evidence; 
the  other,  the  cross-examination  of  the  witnesses 
of  the  opposing  attorney,  in  which  case  lead- 
ing or  even  misleading  questions  are  admitted. 
The  teacher  is  not  concerned  with  the  questions 
in  cross-examination;  he  is  only  examining 
directly  his  own  witnesses. 

From  a  very  human  book  ^  I  copy  a  few 
"Golden  Rules  for  the  Examination  of  Wit- 
nesses," usable  also  by  teachers.  "If  they  [your 
own  witnesses]  are  bold,  and  may  injure  your 
cause  by  pertness  or  forwardness,  observe  a 
gravity  and  ceremony  of  manner  toward  them 
which  may  be  calculated  to  repress  their  as- 
surance. 

"If  they  are  alarmed  or  diffident,  and  their 
thoughts  are  evidently  scattered,  commence 
your  examination  with  matters  of  a  familiar 
character,  remotely  connected  with  the  subject 
of  their  alarm,  or  the  matter  in  issue ;  as,  for 
instance,  where  do  you  live?  Do  you  know 
the  parties  ?     How  long  have  you  known  them  ? 

*  Wellman,  F.  L.,  The  Art  of  Cross-Examination,  Chap.  IX.  Quoted 
from  D.  P.  Brown,  Golden  Rules  for  the  Examination  of  Witnesses. 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  113 

etc.  And  when  you  have  restored  them  to  their 
composure  and  the  mind  has  regained  its  equi- 
librium, proceed  to  the  more  essential  features 
of  the  case,  being  careful  to  be  mild  and  dis- 
tinct in  your  approaches,  lest  you  again  trouble 
the  fountain  at  which  you  are  to  drink. 

"Speak  to  your  witness  clearly  and  dis- 
tinctly, as  if  you  were  awake  and  engaged  in 
a  matter  of  interest  and  make  him  also  speak 
distinctly  and  to  your  question.  How  can  it 
be  supposed  that  the  court  and  jury  will  be 
inclined  to  listen,  when  the  only  struggle  seems 
to  be  whether  the  counsel  or  the  witness  shall 
first  go  to  sleep? 

"Modulate  your  voice  as  circumstance  may 
direct.    '  Inspire  the  fearful  and  repress  the  bold.' 

"Never  begin  before  you  are  ready ^  and  al- 
ways finish  when  you  are  done.  In  other 
words,  do  not  question  for  question's  sake,  but 
for  an  answer'^ 

The  whole  chapter  from  which  these  passages 
are  quoted  will  reward  the  teacher  who  reads  it. 

My  final  injunction  to  teachers  on  the  matter 
of    questioning    is:    we    must    be   more    than 


114  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

questioners  of  pupils  concerning  the  known,  we 
must  be  also  questioners  of  life  concerning  the 
The  Larger  unknown ;  the  former  is  for  our  pupils, 
Questions  ^.j^^  latter  is  for  ourselves.  Bacon  de- 
fined an  experiment  as  a  question  put  to  nature ; 
it  is  the  basis  of  all  scientific  progress.  We 
may  define  philosophy  as  a  question  put  to  the 
world  at  large ;  it  is  the  culmination  of  all  intel- 
lectual progress.  For  the  sake  of  our  teaching 
and  ourselves  we  must  be  constantly  ques- 
tioning both  men  and  things  concerning  what 
we  do  not  know ;  only  so  can  we  question  vitally 
our  pupils  concerning  what  we  do  know.  The 
sense  of  the  unknown  by  contrast  quickens  our 
appreciation  and  realization  of  the  known. 
Only  as  we  question  do  we  know;  only  as  we 
grow  ourselves  can  we  wisely  help  others  grow.  , 
Life  itself  is  a  question,  a  continuing  experi- 
ment, a  process  of  trial  and  error,  the  hunt  for 
an  answer  that  no  man  has  as  yet  fully  found. 

REFERENCES   ON   THE   ART   OF   QUESTIONING 

Bagley,  W.  C,  The  Educative  Process.    N.  Y.,  1906. 
Betts,  G.  H.,  The  Recitation.     Boston,  1911. 
BouTROux,  Emile,  Education  and  Ethies. 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  115 

CoMPAYRE,  G.,  Psychology  Applied  to  Education.    Chap.  IX. 

Boston,  1899. 
De  Garmo,  C,  Interest  and  Education.    Chap.  XTV.    N.  Y., 

1902. 
Fitch,  J.  G.,  The  Art  of  Questioning.     Syracuse,  1897. 
Garlick,   a.   H.,   a  New    Manual   of  Method.     Pp.   60-63. 

N.  Y.,  1904. 
Klemm,  L.  R.,  Chips  from  a  Teacher's  Workshop.    Pp.  117- 

121  and  Chap.  V.     Boston,  1887. 
Landon,  The  Principles  and  Practice  of  Teaching  and  Class 

Management.     7th  ed.     London,  1908. 
Matthew,  Chaps.  XXI-XXIH. 
Mark,  Chaps.  Xl-Xn. 
McLellan  and  Dewey,  Applied  Psychology.    Chaps.  IX-X. 

Boston. 
McMuRRY,   F.   M.,  "Questioning,"  in  Monroe's   Cyclopaedia 

of  Education.    Vol.  VI.    N.  Y.,  1913. 
Morgan,  T.  J.,  Studies  in  Pedagogy.     Chap.  XV. 
Parker,  S.  C,  Methods  of  Teaching  in  High  School.    N.  Y., 

1915. 
Plato,  Meno,  Gorgias,  Protagoras. 
Seeley,  a  New  School  Management.    Chap.  XVI.    N.  Y., 

1903. 
Stevens,  R.,  The  Question  as  a  Measure  of  Efficiency  in  In- 
struction.   N.  Y.,  1912. 
Wellman,  F.  L.,  The  Art  of  Cross-Examination.     N.  Y. 
Xenophon,  Memorabilia.     Bk.  IV,  Chap.  II. 
Young,  W.  T.,  The  Art  of  Putting  Questions.    Syracuse,  1895. 

Questions  on  the  Art  of  Questioning 

1.  What  recognition  did  Plato  give  to  questioning? 

i.   Give  five  reasons  why  it  is  important  to  question  well. 

8.   Why  is  a  good  question  an  aid  in  securing  attention  ? 

4.  What  are  four  general  purposes  of  questioning  ? 

5.  What  is  involved  in  "setting  forward  the  attainment  of 
the  class  in  a  given  field"  ? 


116  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

6.  Name,  describe,  and  illustrate  the  four  kinds  of  questions. 

7.  What  use  may  be  made  of  the  auxiliary  question  in  lec- 
turing to  older  pupils  ? 

8.  What  are  some  of  the  specific  purposes  of  the  searching, 
or  heuristic  question  ? 

9.  Give  some  elementary  and  advanced  questions  on  Lin- 
coln's Gettysburg  Oration. 

10.  Distinguish  the  secondary  and  primary  purposes  of  re- 
view questions. 

11.  Prepare  some  drill  and  some  unifying  review  questions 
in  your  favorite  subject. 

12.  What  are  the  two  purposes  of  an  examinational  question  ? 

13.  Name  six  characteristics  of  the  manner  in  which  ques- 
tions should  be  asked. 

14.  Name  five  characteristics  of  the  form  of  the  question. 

15.  Name  five  characteristics  of  the  content  of  the  question. 

16.  What  ought  the  characteristics  of  the  teacher  as  ques- 
tioner to  be  ? 

17.  Name  three  desirable  characteristics  of  the  answer. 

18.  Why  are  written  answers  sometimes  desirable  ? 

19.  In  what  way  should  an  incorrect  oral  answer  be  treated  ? 

20.  What  types  of  answer  should  be  discouraged  ? 

21.  Name  six  characteristics  of  the  questions  of  Socrates. 

22.  Name  six  characteristics  of  the  questions  of  Jesus. 

23.  Compare  the  questions  of  Socrates  and  Jesus. 

24.  Describe  Mark  Hopkins  as  a  questioner. 

25.  What  may  teachers  learn  from  lawyers  about  questioning  ? 

26.  Why  should  teachers  ask  questions  of  nature  and  of  life  ? 

Suggestions  for  Fubther  Study 

1.  Trace    the    history    of    questioning    as    an    educational 
method. 

2.  Compare  the  relative  benefits  of  questioning  pupils  and 
talking  to  them. 

3.  What  is  the  difference  between  involuntary  and  volun- 
tary attention  ?     (See  any  Psychology.) 


THE  ART  OF  QUESTIONING  117 

4.  Frame  a  good  definition  of  teaching. 

5.  Who  wasTuiskonZiller? 

6.  What  is  the  etymology  of  "heuristic"  ? 

7.  What  is  "the  point  of  contact"  in  teaching  ? 

8.  How  is  clear  speaking  or  writing  related  to  clear  think- 
ing? 

9.  What  is  meant  by  "the  adolescent  mind"  ? 

10.  Formulate  six  good  heuristic  questions  on   the  subject, 
or  subjects,  you  teach. 

11.  Formulate  elementary  and  advanced  heuristic  questions 
on  Washington's  Farewell  Address. 

12.  Under  what  circumstances  may  the  review  of  a  subject 
be  omitted  ? 

13.  Consider  the  good  and  bad  efiFects  of  examinations. 

14.  Prepare  three  examination  questions  that  test  judgment. 

15.  What  criticisms  would  you  make  on  your  own  manner  of 
questioning  ? 

16.  What  criticisms  would  you  make  on  the  form  of  your 
own  questions  ? 

17.  What  criticisms  would  you  make  on  the  content  of  your 
own  questions? 

18.  How  many  questions  do  you  ask  in  a  forty-five  minute 
period  on  the  average  ?    Is  this  too  many  ? 

19.  What  light  on  our  own  teaching  do  the  naturally  humor- 
ous answers  of  pupils  throw? 

20.  Study  the  questions  of  Socrates  in  the  Memorabilia  of 
Xenophon. 

21.  Study  the  questions  of  Jesus  in  the  gospels. 

22.  Was  Socrates  or  Jesus  the  better  questioner  ?     Why  ? 

23.  How  does  the  purpose  of  the  teacher  differ  from  that  of 
the  lawyer  in  questioning  ? 

24.  Formulate  some  questions  whose  answers   you  do  not 
know. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  ART  OF  STUDYING 

There  is  a  gratifying  increase  of  interest 
to-day  in  the  art  of  studying.  Teachers  are 
The  New  asking,  as  never  before,  I  beheve,  in 
Jws"^*^  the  history  of  their  profession,  how 
Subject  ^Yiey  themselves  ought  to  study  and 
how  they  may  get  their  pupils  to  study  in  the 
best  way.  Several  new  books  on  the  subject, 
referred  to  in  the  list  at  the  end  of  this  chapter, 
have  been  put  forth  to  meet  this  demand  on  the 
part  of  teachers  and  to  help  stimulate  it  too. 
For  once  one  can  hardly  refer  to  this  increas- 
ing interest  as  a  revival  of  an  old  one;  it  is  a 
new  phenomenon.  The  only  thing  comparable 
to  it  heretofore  occurred  at  the  time  of  the 
Renaissance  and  after,  when  the  humanistic 
scholars  like  Erasmus  were  concerned  with 
the  right  method  of  study  along  with  their 
interest  in  the  classics.  Following  in  the  wake 
of  the  Revival  of  Learning  certain  philosophers 

118 


THE  ART   OF  STUDYING  119 

like  Bacon,  Locke,  and  Descartes  were  con- 
cerned with  the  methods  of  investigation,  the 
conduct  of  the  human  understanding,  and  the 
principles  of  clear  thinking.  These  old  writings 
are  still  worth  the  time  spent  in  pondering  them 
by  the  modern  student.  On  the  whole  only 
greatly  desirable  results  may  be  anticipated 
from  the  present  momentum  of  interest  in  the 
best  way  to  study,  such  as  increased  pleasure 
in  the  process  and  increased  profit  in  the  result. 
One  of  the  great  ideas  of  our  time  is  con- 
servation and  the  elimination  of  waste.  As  a 
people  Americans  are  relatively  thrift-  present- 
less  and  wasteful.  This  is  largely  due  ^g^f^*® 
to  our  enormous  resources  and  our  ^^^^^ 
prosperity,  and  the  consequent  absence  of 
saving  as  a  necessary  virtue.  This  trait  of 
wastefulness  appears  all  through  our  life,  even 
in  our  educational  system.  Perhaps  the  great- 
est single  source  of  waste  in  our  educational 
work  is  the  wrong  use  of  time,  which  we  spend 
too  much  in  hearing  recitations  and  discovering 
what  pupils  have  already  learned  and  too  little 
in  training  them  to  study.     We  practise  them 


no  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

too  much  in  telling  what  they  know  and  too  little 
in  learning  how  to  know.  Our  pupils  spend  too 
much  of  their  time  in  learning  what  the  book  says 
and  too  little  in  facing  problems  for  themselves. 
The  result  is  that  our  pupils  leave  school  with 
a  store  of  information  but  with  very  little  ability 
to  handle  situations.  We  can  conserve  the 
pupils'  time  and  eliminate  much  educational 
waste  by  training  them  in  the  art  of  study. 

How    shall    we    define    study.'*     The    great 

thinker,  Immanuel  Kant,  said  that  a  definition 

should  come  at  the  end,  not  at  the 

Definition 

of  Study  beginning,  of  an  inquiry.  Such  a  pro- 
Kant  on  cedure  is  inductive,  Socratic,  and  in 
accord  with  the  way  the  mind  does 
move  in  framing  a  definition  for  the  first  time. 
But  for  purposes  of  logical  exposition,  it  will 
help  us  to  begin  with  a  definition  of  terms. 
It  is  easy  to  define  study  in  too  narrow  a  way, 

as  in  Hinsdale's  definition:  "Study  is 
Too 

Narrow  a  the  use  of  books  for  the  serious  pur- 
Definition 

pose    of    gaining   knowledge."  ^      But 
surely  one  may  also  study  man  and  nature. 

1  Hinsdale,  The  Art  of  Study,  p.  18. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  121 

Let  us  try  this  definition  :  Study  is  the  mental 
process  of  mastering  a  problem.  This  problem 
may  be  of  any  kind  whatsoever,  in- 

Definition 

volving  things,  or  words,  or  both. 
As  the  Greek  etymology  of  the  term  suggests,  a 
"problem*'  is  "something  thrown  before"  the 
mind,  some  obstacle  to  be  surmounted,  some 
situation  requiring  serious  thought  to  handle  it 
aright,  some  difficulty  requiring  a  solution. 
Everybody  in  every  walk  of  life  must  at  times 
face  real  problems  and  try  to  solve  them. 
Study  is  the  mental  process  by  which  this  is 
done. 

That  real  study  involves  an  application  of 
the  mind  to  the  matter  in  hand  will  not  be 
questioned,  an  application  not  always 

Mental 

agreeable  in  itself,  though  its  ultimate  AppUcation 

Involved 

consequences  are.  As  the  educa- 
tional proverb,  attributed  by  Diogenes  Laertius 
to  Aristotle,  and  repeated  by  Plutarch  and 
Alcuin,  has  it:  "The  roots  of  learning  are 
bitter,  but  its  fruits  are  sweet."  Study  is 
indeed  mental  application,  but  what  we  need 
to  know  is  how  the  mind  works  in  applying 


122  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

itself  to  any  problem.  We  can  take  up  this 
question  best,  however,  a  little  later  in  im- 
mediate connection  with  the  practical  topic, 
how  to  train  pupils  to  study.  For  the  pres- 
ent let  us  consider  certain  large  matters  con- 
cerned with  the  approach  to  the  subject  of 
study. 

There  are  certain  general  presuppositions 
which  must  be  taken  for  granted  if  study  is  to 
General  prove  very  fruitful.  One  is  that  study 
Stkms  of"  ^^  ^  certain  type  of  life,  that  is,  in  case 
study  ^g  ^j.Q  |.Q  Y)e  constantly  progressing. 
It  is  artificial  to  call  certain  young  people  in 
The  Life  school  "students"  and  not  allow  the 
of  study  term  to  others  or  to  the  same  per- 
sons later  in  their  lives.  The  fact  is,  the  real 
student  spends  his  whole  time  either  in  studying 
or  in  preparing  to  study.  Again  it  is  artificial 
to  suppose  one  can  be  too  busy  in  any  human 
relationship  to  find  time  for  study ;  rather,  our 
human  business  is  a  shining  opportunity  for 
study.  A  purely  mechanical  occupation  soon 
exhausts  our  ability  to  study  it.  Teachers  in 
the  schoolroom,  if   they  will,   may  study  their 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  128 

pupils  as  well  as  teach  them,  and  so  come  to 
teach  them  better.  So  may  parents  in  the 
home.  So  may  all  persons  whose  occupations 
involve  relationships  to  life. 

Again,  the  real  student  has  many  interests. 
Not  enough,  indeed,  to  scatter  his  forces,  but 
he  has  enough  to  meet  his  fellows  on  j^ 
their  plane  of  interest  without  always  ^*®^®sts 
or  usually  requiring  them  to  come  to  his  plane. 
The  student  has  his  specialty  which  he  should 
let  spread  out  through  its  relations  to  many 
difiFerent  things.  To  have  many  such  second- 
ary interests  counteracts  the  deadening  influ- 
ence of  routine,  prevents  narrowness,  promotes 
sociality,  and  discourages  eccentricity.  To 
have  many  interests  is  like  fishing  with  many 
baited  hooks  in  the  stream.  Among  his  many 
ramified  interests  in  life  is  a  central  one.  This 
is  his  main  object  of  study.  It  engrosses  the 
most  of  his  attention,  and  the  attention  he  gives 
to  it  is  involuntary,  without  the  sense  of  com- 
pulsion, and  accompanied  by  pleasure.  He 
warms  his  soul  at  this  central  hearth  stone, 
though  he  is  often  chary  of  admitting  others 


1^  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

here,  for  fear  of  thrusting  his  interests  on  others 
and  "talking  shop." 

There  is  no  real  study  without  independence : 
independence  of  judgment  and,  to  a  certain 
indepen-  extent,  independence  of  the  deaden- 
dence  j^^g  routine  of  a  mechanical  occupa- 
tion. The  student  must  have  some  free  time 
to  think  his  own  thoughts  as  well  as  to  master 
the  thoughts  of  others  and  to  observe  his  prob- 
lem for  himself.  The  logicians  warn  us  of  the 
fallacy  of  paying  undue  respect  to  a  noted 
authority, — argumentum  ad  verecundiam.  This 
warning  is  especially  applicable  when  an  author- 
ity noted  in  one  field  is  invoked  to  settle  a 
question  in  a  different  field.  One  is  entitled  to 
respect  as  an  authority  in  a  field  only  in  pro- 
portion as  he  has  mastered  the  problems  of  that 
field.  The  aim  of  the  real  student  is,  or  should 
be,  to  master  the  problems  in  his  chosen  field 
for  himself.  He  learns  from  all,  but  he  does  his 
own  thinking. 

At  the  conclusion  of  one  of  his  arguments 
Professor  Paulsen  remarks,  "And  after  all, 
when  we  come  to  think  of  it,  error  alone  is 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  1«5 

dangerous ;  things  are  what  they  are ;  how  can 
true  ideas  concerning  them  harm  us,  or  false 
ones  benefit  us  ?  "  *  In  accord  with  the  ,^^  Love 
spirit  of  this  remark  of  a  great  student  ^^  '^^^ 
and  teacher,  we  may  say  the  true  student  is  a 
lover  of  truth.  He  looks  for  the  truth,  in  sys- 
tems and  beyond  systems,  in  doctrines  and 
beyond  doctrines,  in  science  and  beyond  science. 
He  is  bound  by  no  traditions  except  those  whose 
inherent  truth  is  still  a  vital  force.  In  his 
inward  soul  he  subscribes  to  those  great  words 
written  in  his  private  diary  by  the  noble  Roman 
Stoic  and  emperor:  "If  any  man  is  able  to 
convince  me  and  show  me  that  I  do  not  think 
or  act  right,  I  will  gladly  change ;  for  I  seek  the 
truth  by  which  no  man  was  ever  injured.  But 
he  is  injured  who  abides  in  his  error  and  igno- 
rance." *  This  is  intellectual  hospitality,  can- 
dor, sincerity,  honesty,  which  are  inseparable 
from  the  love  of  truth. 

Aristotle  wrote  in  the  first  book  of  his  Ethics, 
having  Plato,   who  had  been  his   teacher  for 

»  Paulsen.  Introduction  to  Philosophy,  p.  74  (Thilly  Tr.).    N.  Y.,  189a 
«  M.  Aurelius,  Thoughts,  VI,  21  (Long  Tr.). 


126  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

twenty  years,  in  mind :  "Our  friends  and  truth 
are  both  dear  to  us ;  but  it  would  be  impiety 
Aristotle  -^^t  to  give  the  first  place  to  truth." 
the^Love^^  Commenting  on  this  statement,  Bur- 
of  Truth  j^g^i  says^  "This  has  become  almost 
proverbial  in  the  form  given  to  it  by  Cicero, 
*  Plato  is  my  friend,  but  truth  is  more  so.'" 
Thus  truth  requires  of  the  student  a  kind  of 
impersonal  allegiance. 

The  real  student  loves  the  truth  that  he 
may  become  free  himself,  free  from  ignorance 
Truth  and  ^^^  ^^^  consequcnces,  and  also  that 
Freedom  ^le  may  help  make  men  free.  It  is 
only  in  fun  that  we  can  say  with  Pudd'nhead 
Wilson,  *' Truth  is  precious,  therefore  let  us  be 
saving  of  it."  Jesus  taught,  "The  truth  shall 
make  you  free,"  and  that  we  are  witnesses  to 
the  truth. 

The  ideal  of  the  student  is  knowledge  and 
its  use.  The  truth  in  its  eternal  nature  may  be 
one  and  unchangeable,  but  man's  knowledge  of 
the  truth  is  a  constantly  unfolding  and  growing 
process,  and  man's  use  of  such  knowledge  lags 

1  Burnet,  Aristotle  on  Education,  p.  21.     Cambridge,  1905. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  127 

still  behind.  The  real  student  loves  the  truth 
so  well  that  he  is  willing  and  glad  to  have  his 
false  or  inadequate  views  of  it  refuted  or  en- 
larged. The  sense  that  the  whole  truth  is 
now  known  is  the  grave  of  the  student's  enter- 
prise and  power.  The  soul  of  the  teacher  who 
supposes  he  need  not  study  any  more  is  already 
dying. 

In  what  was  said  above  concerning  the  life 
of  study  it  was  implied  that  study  should  be 
both  a  habit  and  an  ideal.  Study  xhe  Habit 
should  be  so  ingrained  as  a  habit  as  to  °*  ^^^^^ 
have  become  a  second  nature.  The  real  stu- 
dent is  studying  men  and  things  even  when  he 
is  not  aware  of  doing  so,  and  without  having 
especially  set  himself  to  do  it.  Without  such 
a  mechanism,  such  an  automatism,  at  the  basis 
of  study  we  can  hardly  hope  to  arrive  any- 
where or  to  derive  the  best  benefits.  We  must 
avoid  "the  agony  of  starting,"  we  must  have 
regular,  but  in  no  case  rigid,  study-hours,  we 
must  allow  adequate  time  for  physical  and 
mental  recreation  in  the  open  air  and  with  our 
fellows,  we  must  sleep  as  much  as  we  require 


128  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

for  best  work,  and  we  must  eat  a  merely  sujBS- 
cient  quantity  of  wholesome  food.  It  is  un- 
wise economy  for  the  student  to  neglect  the 
claims  of  the  physical  man  in  any  way.  Study 
cannot  be  the  efficient  habit  it  should  be  with- 
out a  dependable  supporting  physique. 

We  must  also  presuppose  on  the  part  of  the 
student  that  study  is  not  only  a  habit,  but  also 
The  Ideal  ^^  ideal.  When  under  new  circum- 
of  study  stances  his  habit  fails  him,  his  ideal 
will  carry  him  through;  and  when  under  old 
circumstances  his  habit  fails  him  through  the 
deadening  effects  of  routine,  his  ideal  again  will 
come  to  his  aid.  Study  is  an  ideal  for  the  stu- 
dent because  he  has  the  will  to  know  as  its 
efficient  cause  and  the  purpose  to  enable  both 
himseK  and  others  to  profit  by  his  attainment 
as  the  final  cause.  There  is  no  study  that 
avails  apart  from  the  student's  real  desire  to 
learn,  apart  from  genuine  interest  in  the  sub- 
ject-matter. Too  frequently  this  will  to  learn 
is  absent  from  the  lives  of  pupils  and  teachers. 
Really  it  should  be  the  culmination  of  the  child's 
instinct  of  curiosity;    too  often  this  instinct  is 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  129 

deadened  by  compulsory  routine.  Teachers 
must  fight  to  keep  alive  the  strong  native 
instinct  of  curiosity  in  their  pupils  and  in  them- 
selves. Truth  cannot  reveal  itself  to  listless 
worshippers. 

From  these  general  presuppositions  of  study, 
which  help  us  to  approach  the  subject  in  the 
right  spirit,  we  turn  now  to  more  practical 
matters. 

The  important  thing  in  connection  with  the 
mechanical  aids  to  study  is  that  each  individual 
student  should  develop  his  own.     The 

Mechani- 

great  Orientalist,  Max  Miiller,  found  caiAids 

to  study 

the  paper-pad  note-book  of  indispen- 
sable  aid,   and   recommended   its   use   to   Ox- 
ford students.     A  file  of  references  on  each  of 

the  main   subjects  of  interest  to  the 

.  ,  References 

student  is  a  great  aid  when  the  time 

comes  to  master  and  to  use  the  knowledge  of 
any  particular  topic.  The  making  of  a  card- 
catalogue,  if  not  too  troublesome,  will  serve 
the  same  purpose.  Every  periodical  issuing  an 
index  will  be  carefully  filed  away.  The  mak- 
ing of  bibliographies,  as  the  better  books  come 


130  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

to  one's  attention,  is  most  serviceable.  Even 
newspaper  clippings,  when  they  are  evidently 
dependable,  are  well  worth  while. 

Every  student  will  take  pride  in  his  private 
library,  which  is  his  workshop,  the  one  essential 
One's  qualification  of  which  is  that  it  be  a 
Library  growing  one.  It  is  not  important  to 
own  many  books :  it  is  important  to  know  well 
those  you  do  own ;  it  is  not  the  having  but  the 
knowing  of  books  that  counts.  Naturally  one 
will  keep  a  list  of  books  to  buy,  and,  as  most 
students  are  not  large  money-earners,  will  be 
on  the  watch  for  advantageous  sales  of  books; 
but  he  will  never  buy  for  the  sake  of  buying,  but 
only  to  satisfy  a  real  need.  The  student  who 
would  be  a  scholar  must  command  other  lan- 
guages than  his  own,  as  tools.  Then,  too, 
there  should  be  a  place  for  everything  that 
comes  to  one's  desk;  a  glance  will  indicate 
whether  the  waste-basket  or  some  particular 
pigeon-hole  is  the  right  place. 

But  the  most  profitable  single  mechanical 
aid  to  the  student  is  to  have  a  weekly  program 
of  work,  indicating  how  the  waking  hours  should 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  131 

be  spent.  Such  a  program  will  allow  ample 
time  also  for  recreation,  social  duties,  and  des- 
ultory reading.  The  length  of  the  p^^^^ 
day  is  the  same  for  all  alike;  given  ^^^^^^ 
the  same  capacity  for  work,  those  accomplish 
most  who  have  the  best  program.  It  will 
require  a  delicate  application  of  one's  phi- 
losophy of  life  to  construct  this  plan  of  how  to 
spend  one's  time  in  the  best  way.  Without 
some  such  schedule,  we  lose  much  time  in  decid- 
ing what  to  do  next,  and  then  are  not  quite 
sure  whether  we  have  decided  aright.  From 
this  account  of  the  mechanical  aids  to  study  we 
learn  that  the  aim  of  the  student  is  not  to  know 
everything  but  where  to  jBnd  anything  he  needs, 
that  the  brain  is  not  so  much  a  repository  of 
knowledge  as  an  instrument  for  gathering  it, 
and  that  study  is  a  continuous  process  of 
gathering  usable  truth. 

As   there   are   mechanical  aids   to   study,   so 
also  there  are  physical  conditions   of 

Physical 

study.     These    conditions,    as    those  Conditions 

.  ,  .  ,     ,  of  study 

aids,   require   no   extended   treatment 

here;   it  is  enough  for  our  present  purpose  to 


132  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

indicate  their  importance  by  calling  attention 
to  them  and  by  a  passing  mention. 

First  of  all  the  physical  conditions  is  the 
rested  brain  and  the  not-too-tired  body.  It 
Brain  and  ii^^dly  pays  to  undertake  serious  study 
Body  when  the  brain,  the  instrument  of  the 

mind,  is  already  fagged,  or  when  the  body  is 
exhausted  from  any  form  of  muscular  exertion. 
Then,  the  light  should  be  right,  pref- 

Light 

erably  from  the  rear  or,  in  the  case 
of  right-handed  persons,  from  the  left.  The 
eyes  should  be  shaded  and  in  no  instance  should 
the  angle  of  reflection  carry  the  light  waves 
into  the  eyes.  Reading  in  the  sun,  or  lying 
down,  or  when  in  rough  motion,  as  on  the 
usual  trains,  is  objectionable.  Under  these 
circumstances  one  might  better  occupy  his 
mind,  if  alone,  in  reflecting  on  what  he  has  read 
and  in  planning ;  ^  but  if  read  he  must,  let  it 
be  from  a  text  in  large  print.  The  paper 
should  be  unglazed,  the  lines  not  too  long,  for 
the  sake  of  economy  in  eye-motion  for  rapid 
readers,  and  with  good  spaces  between  the  lines. 

*  Cf.  Arnold  Bennett,  How  to  live  on  Twenty-four  Hours  a  Day. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  138 

The  best  temperature  for  health  in  the  study 
or  schoolroom  does  not  exceed  68°.  For  good 
ventilation    one   must   rely    upon   his 

Tempera- 
reason    and    his    sense    of    drowsmess,  ture  and 

Ventilation 

not  upon  his  olfactory  nerves  which 
quickly  fatigue  under  any  constant  stimulus 
such  as  vitiated  air  provides.  One's  study 
should  be  located  in  a  quiet  part  of  the  house, 
and  the  study-hours  should  be  kept  as  free 
from  interruption  as  possible.  The  best  phys- 
ical conditions  for  study  are  not  always  to  be 
had,  especially  as  regards  quiet  and  freedom 
from  interruption,  and  the  good  student  who  re- 
gards his  time  not  as  money  but  as  beyond  all 
money  will  learn  also  how  to  work  under  dis- 
advantages; he  will  make  the  conditions  con- 
form to  his  standard  when  he  can,  and  when 
he  cannot,  he  will  conform  to  the  conditions. 
Through  the  act  of  willing  what  is  annoying, 
though  inevitable,  the  mind  rises  superior  to 
thwarting  circumstance.^ 

Thus  at  length  we  reach  that  phase  of  our 
topic  which  was  probably  first  suggested  to  the 

*  I.  Kant,  On  the  Power  of  the  Mind. 


134  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

mind  of  the  reader  at  the  sight  of  the  title 
of  this  chapter,  viz.  How  shall  I  study?  Im- 
jjq^^q  mediately  following  this  question  be- 
study  longs  the  related  one,  How  shall  I 
train  my  pupils  to  study?  for,  of  course,  the 
way  to  train  my  pupils  to  study  is  just  the  prac- 
tical application  of  the  way  I  should 

Related       study  myself.     And  immediately  con- 
Questions 

nected  with  both  these  questions  is  a 

third,  How  shall  I  teach?  though  this  last  can 

receive  but  brief  treatment  in  the  discussion  of 

study.     Studying,  training  pupils  to  study,  and 

teaching    are    three    closely   related   processes. 

Good  teaching  is  certainly  a  great  aid  to  pupils 

in  learning  how  to  study,  but  it  is  not  alone 

sufficient. 

How  shall  one  study?     A  short  initial,  very 

suggestive,  and  yet  inadequate  answer  would 

be,  apply  the  Herbartian  formal  steps 

Teaching  '      ^^  «^  ^ 

Oneself  by  of  method  to  oucsclf ;    that  is,  teach 

the  Her- 
bartian       the  lesson  to  yourself  in  the  approved 
Formula        «     i  .  i     «  ,  .  .  , 

tashion  beiore  teaching  it  to  others 
by  (1)  preparing  your  mind  to  undertake  the 
work;     (2)    covering    the    material    point    by 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  135 

point ;  (3)  comparing  the  various  points ;  (4) 
generalizing;  and  (5)  making  applications  of 
the  generalization. 

There  are  indeed  some  valuable  hints  here 
for  the  process  of  studying,  especially  in  study- 
ing books,  as  we  shall  see,  but  there 

Weakness 

are   also   several  weaknesses,   viz.    (1)  of  this 

Procediire 

you  must  already  know  the  lesson  be- 
fore you  can  teach  it  to  yourself  in  this  way, 
and  how  did  you  study  in  the  first  place  in 
order  to  master  the  lesson.'^  (2)  This  method 
of  study  would  apply  very  well  to  books,  but 
how  would  it  apply  to  things,  in  the  study  of 
which  observation,  hypothesis,  verification,  etc., 
play  so  large  a  r61e  ?  (3)  This  method  of  study 
takes  no  account  of  the  motives  regularly 
prompting  us  to  study,  such  as  some  felt  need 
or  practical  problem.  And  (4)  this  method  of 
teaching  and  studying  is  better  suited  to  the 
imparting  of  knowledge  than  to  the  develop- 
ment of  ability  in  handling  new  difiiculties. 

If  we  cannot  accept  the  Herbartian  intel- 
lectual formula  for  teaching  as  a  guide  in  our 
own   study,   how   then   shall   we   study?     An 


136  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

analysis  of  a  completed  study  process  reveals 
just  four  main  types  of  mental  operation,  viz. 
Four  (1)  facing  a  problem ;    (2)  hunting  for 

tiiTstudy  ^  solution;  (3)  recognizing  the  right 
Process  solution ;  and  (4)  using  the  solution. 
So  long  as  what  we  are  doing  proceeds  suc- 
cessfully and  smoothly,  there  is  no  problem 
and  we  do  not  study.  But  as  soon  as  some 
hitch  comes  in  the  process  of  acting,  then  we 
halt,  begin  to  study,  hunt  for  a  solution,  some- 
times hitting  upon  it  almost  or  entirely  by 
accident,  recognizing  it  when  we  have  it,  and 
using  it. 

A  simple  illustration  will  show  the  four 
phases  of  the  process.  A  farmer  is  ploughing 
niustra-  ^^  ^  rough  field.  He  strikes  a  tough 
**°^  root  and  breaks  the  end  oflf  the  point 

of  his  plough.  What  shall  he  do?  He  can- 
vasses all  the  possibilities  in  his  mind,  such  as 
going  on  with  a  broken  point  as  best  he  can, 
going  away  to  get  a  new  point,  changing  his 
work  from  ploughing  to  hoeing,  etc.  Finally,  he 
decides  it  is  best  to  go  after  a  new  point,  does 
so,   and  then  proceeds  with  his  ploughing  as 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  137 

before.  If  he  is  wise,  he  will  bring  more  than 
one  new  point ;  and  if  he  had  been  still  wiser, 
he  would  have  anticipated  breaking  a  point  in 
that  field  and  would  have  come  provided.  This 
is  a  type  of  all  real  study.  A  problem  arises, 
usually  unexpectedly ;  we  try  to  find  a  solution  ; 
the  solution  is  finally  recognized,  if  we  are  able 
to  solve  the  problem  at  all ;  and,  applying  the 
solution,  we  proceed  as  best  we  can  until  a  new 
problem  arises. 

Take  another  illustration.  A  boy  is  in- 
terested in  birds.  He  hears  a  new  note.  It 
puzzles  him.  He  cannot  identify  it.  Another  li- 
lt is  like  that  of  a  hermit- thrush,  but  lustration 
it  is  not  a  hermit-thrush's.  He  sights  the  bird. 
It  is  reddish  brown  above  and  faintly  spotted 
with  brown  below.  Home  he  goes  with  all  his 
observations  in  mind,  regarding  the  song,  the 
size,  the  color,  the  shape  of  the  new  bird.  He 
eagerly  consults  his  bird-book  for  identification. 
Finally  he  decides  it  is  a  veery,  and  plans  to 
see  and  hear  his  new  acquaintance  again. 
This  is  typical  of  real  study.  Out  of  a  real 
situation  comes  a  new  interest,  need,  or  problem ; 


138  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

it  is  faced  and  met ;  the  solution  finally  comes ; 
the  solution  is  used.  Sometimes  it  takes  years 
to  find  the  solution  to  a  difficult  problem. 

The  situation  is  not  different  in  pure  re- 
search. One  has  an  interesting  problem.  It 
p^g  may  be  only  a  theoretical  and  not  a 

Research  practical  problem,  but  it  is  interest- 
ing. To  satisfy  this  interest  is  practical  in  a 
broad  sense  of  the  term  to  the  scientist  devoted 
to  research.  The  observations  and  exper- 
iments are  many.  Finally,  it  may  be  after 
years,  the  solution  is  found.  It  works.  The  in- 
terest is  satisfied.  Meanwhile  another  interest, 
perhaps  many  of  them,  has  been  developed. 
One  of  these  is  taken  up  and  pursued.  It  may 
be  laid  aside  in  discouragement  for  a  while,  and 
then  taken  up  again.  Such  a  student  we  call 
a  pure  scientist.  He  is  discovering  truth,  not 
caring  whether  it  is  immediately  practical.  It 
satisfies  his  interests  to  go  on.  By  and  by 
some  practical  genius  may  turn  to  good  account 
the  discoveries  of  the  scientist,  improving 
thereby  the  lot  of  mankind.  So  actually  did 
Marconi  in  devising  the  wireless  telegraph  on  the 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  139 

basis  of  the  pure  researches  of  J.  J.  Thomson 
and  Lord  Kelvin. 

All  this  may  seem  remote  enough  from  school 
study,  and  it  may  be,  but  it  should  not  be. 
These  illustrations  show  us  what  real  study, 
in  distinction  from  formal  study,  truly  is. 
First  a  problem,  then  the  attack  on  it,  then  the 
solution,  then  the  use  of  the  solution.  During 
the  process  we  are  really  interested,  attentive, 
have  lost  the  sense  of  time,  have  found  out 
something,  have  expressed  ourselves,  and  have 
the  sense  of  dealing  with  real  values. 

How  then  shall  I  study  .^  First,  get  my 
problem;  my  life  itself  gives  it  to  me, 
many  of  them  in  fact;  sometimes  HowShaU 
several  in  a  day.     Sense  it.     Realize  ^' 

the  need   of   solving   it.     Real    study  Problem 
always  has  a  purpose  in  it,  a  motive  behind  it. 

Second,  hunt  for  the  solution.  This  is  in- 
deed a  complex   and   varied  process, 

r         .  1  The  Hunt 

dependent     for    its     character     some- 
what upon  the  problem  itself,  whether  bookish, 
naturalistic,  etc.     But  in  hunting  for  the  so- 
lution it  will  always  help  us  (1)  to  use  all  the 


140  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

knowledge  we  already  have;  (2)  to  have  some 
guess  in  mind  as  to  what  the  solution  is;  (3) 
to  get  all  the  facts  bearing  on  the  question 
we  can  before  us,  by  observation,  reading, 
conversing  with  others,  etc. ;  (4)  to  analyze 
our  problem  or  material  into  its  essential  and 
component  parts  when  we  can;  and  (5)  to  be 
constantly  testing  the  guess  we  have  in  mind 
and  as  constantly  putting  it  aside  for  another 
one  until  the  happy  solution  is  reached. 

Third,  we  recognize  the  solution  which  we 
seek.  The  answer  has  been  found.  We  can 
Finding  the  ^ecognize  the  solution  when  finally 
Solution  found  because  it  works,  solves  the 
difficulty,  answers  the  question.  The  fortu- 
nate guess  we  made  has  been  verified.  And 
when  found,  we  must  formulate  the  answer 
definitely,  give  it  a  name,  state  it  as  a  propo- 
sition, conceive  it  in  general  terms,  and  fix  it 
in  mind.     So  we  keep  it  for  use. 

Fourth,  set  the  solution  to  work.  What 
diflference  does  it  make  to  life  and  conduct? 
Use  What  does  it  lead  us  to  do  ?    What  sug- 

gestions about  further  truth  does  it  awaken? 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  141 

What  related  problem  may  have  the  same  or 
a  similar  solution?  Shall  the  truth  be  done? 
What  person,  or  class  of  persons,  needs  to  know 
this  truth?  So  the  truth  begins  to  shape  and 
inspire  life. 

Thus  we  find  four  main  factors  in  the  mental 
process  of  mastering  a  problem  which  we  call 
study,  viz.  the  sense  of  facing  a  problem,  the 
search  for  the  solution,  the  solution  itself,  and 
finally  its  use.  In  a  somewhat  more  detailed  way 
Dr.  McMurry,  in  his  recent  very  valuable  book 
on  How  to  Study,  finds  eight  factors :  viz.  pur- 
pose, supplementing,  organizing,  judging,  mem- 
orizing, using,  questioning,  and  individuality. 

The  bare  statement  of  these  eight  principal 
factors  in  study  according  to  Dr.  McMurry 
should  be  supplemented  by  one  of  his  own 
summarizing  paragraphs  on  "the  meaning  of 
study,"  as  follows : 

True  or  logical  study  is  not  aimless  mental  activity  or  a 
passive  reception  of  ideas  only  for  the  sake  of  having  them. 
It  is  the  vigorous  application  of  the  mind  to  a  subject  for 
the  satisfaction  of  a  felt  need.  Instead  of  being  aimless, 
every  portion  of  efiFort  put  forth  is  an  organic  step  toward 
the  accomplishment  of  a  specific  purpose ;  instead  of  being 


142  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

passive,  it  requires  the  reaction  of  the  self  upon  the  ideas 
presented  until  they  are  supplemented,  organized,  and 
tentatively  judged,  so  that  they  are  held  well  in  memory. 
The  study  of  a  subject  has  not  reached  its  end  until  the 
guiding  purpose  has  been  accomplished  and  the  knowledge 
has  been  so  assimilated  that  it  has  been  used  in  a  normal 
way  and  has  become  experience.  And,  finally,  since  the 
danger  of  submergence  of  self  among  so  much  foreign 
thought  is  so  great  it  is  not  complete  —  at  least  for  young 
students  —  until  precautions  for  the  preservation  of  indi- 
viduality have  been  included.^ 

There  is  evidently  no  contradiction  between 
the  list  of  four  and  the  list  of  eight  factors. 
The  diflFerence  is  that  the  list  of  four  looks  at 
study  as  the  mental  process  of  mastering  a 
problem,  bringing  out  the  indispensable  essen- 
tials in  this  process,  while  the  list  of  eight  in- 
cludes certain  related  matters  like  memorizing, 
maintaining  the  questioning  attitude,  and  pre- 
serving individual  initiative,  which  we  have 
stressed,  or  which  we  shall  have  occasion  to 
stress,  in  another  connection. 

The  four  main  factors  of  study  appear  in 
mastering  every  problem,  whether  of  life,  lab- 
oratory,   or   book.     But   so  much  of  the  time 

1 F.  M.  McMurry.  How  to  Study,  p.  283.    Boston,  1909. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  143 

of  teachers  and  pupils  alike  is  spent  in  study- 
ing books,  and  necessarily  so,  that  these  four 
factors   should   be   restated   from    the 

How  to 

standpoint    of    mastering    an    assign-  study  a 

All  •  •  1     Text 

ment  m  a  text.  And  here  using,  with 
modifications,  the  Herbartian  formula  on  one- 
self is  more  suggestive,  as  this  formula  is  more 
successful  in  learning  or  in  imparting  what  is 
already  known  than  in  discovering  for  oneself 
what  is  unknown. 

First,  as  before,  define  the  need  which  prompts 
you  to  study.  What  need  have  I  leading  me 
to  undertake  this  piece  of  intellectual  ^  Define 
work?  At  what  problem  am  I  work-  Your  Need 
ing?  This  felt  and  formulated  need  should 
be  at  the  basis  of  every  piece  of  study. 

In  connection  with  defining  one's  need,  it 
will  also  be  profitable  to  revive  your  present 
knowledge  of  the  subject.     What  do 

Awaken 
I    already    know    about    this    subject?   old  As- 
sociations 

To  answer  this  question  will  help  de- 
fine your  need,  will  increase  your  apperceiving 
power,  will  enable  you  to  take  a  more  inde- 
pendent attitude  toward  what  you  read,  and 


144  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

will  enhance  the  suggestive  power  of  the  material 
before  you. 

Then,  go  through  the   material,  whatever  it 

is,  leisurely,  and  with  concentrated  attention, 

and  pick  out  the  main  points;    that 

2.  Analyze    ,  i  i  i  • 

IS,  analyze  the  subject  studied.  Study 
leisurely  that  the  pertinent  associations  of  the 
subject  may  have  time  to  come  into  mind,  that 
you  may  stop  and  think  out  a  suggestion  to 
its  end,  that  your  critical  faculty  may  react. 
James  Bryce  gives  us  this  advice :  "One  should 
read  in  a  critical,  that  is  to  say,  a  searching, 
testing  spirit.  Our  spirit  ought,  no  doubt,  to 
be  respectful  to  the  author  of  the  book,  if  he 
happens  to  be  a  well-informed  man;  but  re- 
spect is  not  the  same  thing  as  submission." 
Milton  ^  likewise  urges  reading  independently 

upon  us,  as  follows : 

However,  many  books. 

Wise  men  have  said,  are  wearisome ;  who  reads 

Incessantly,  and  to  his  reading  brings  not 

A  spirit  and  judgment  equal  or  superior, 

(And  what  he  brings  what  needs  he  elsewhere  seek  ?) 

Uncertain  and  unsettled  still  remains. 

Deep- versed  in  books  and  shallow  in  himself, 

1  Paradise  Regained.  Bk.  IV.  U.  321-831. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  145 

Crude  or  intoxicate,  collecting  toys 

And  trifles  for  choice  matters,  worth  a  sponge, 

As  children  gathering  pebbles  on  the  shore. 

Studying  leisurely  in  this  way  is  the  golden 
mean  between  idle  reading  as  a  mere  pastime, 
taking  an  intellectual  stroll,  on  the  one  hand, 
and  cramming  the  mind  with  undigested  and 
unrelated  facts,  on  the  other  hand.  I  do  not 
say  never  stroll  and  I  do  not  say  never 
cram;  both  operations  have  their  uses;  but 
neither  of  them  is  true,  purposeful,  growth- 
securing  study.  Studying  with  a  concentrated 
attention  is  again  a  mean,  distinguished  on  the 
one  hand  from  the  wandering  or  divided  at- 
tention, which  is  as  much  interested  in  other 
things  as  in  the  business  in  hand,  and  the 
strained  attention  based  on  the  keyed-up  nerves 
of  the  student.  President  King  writes  so  well 
on  this  point  that  I  must  let  him  speak : 

There  is  study  and  study.  Much  that  is  so  called 
hardly  deserves  the  name.  And  the  kind  of  study  that  a 
man  does  affects  the  whole  man.  Many  students  would 
gain  by  shortening  their  hours  of  so-called  study,  by 
stopping  more  frequently  for  brief  periods  of  rest,  and  by 
studying  with  determined  concentration  while  at  it.    This 


146  THREE  SCHOOL  AETS 

does  not  mean  working  on  one's  nerves,  in  a  tense,  strained 
attitude  of  mind,  but  cool,  calm,  steady  attention  to  the 
work  in  hand,  and  to  that  alone,  even  if  the  mail  comes  in 
the  midst  of  one's  study.  It  is  a  great  epoch  in  a  student's 
career  when  he  has  had  experience  of  the  joy  and  achieve- 
ment of  the  best  concentration  of  which  he  is  capable. 
Now  he  knows  what  study  means,  and  he  cannot  again 
content  himself  with  sitting  before  an  open  textbook, 
while  from  time  to  time  he  recalls  his  mind  from  the  ends  of 
the  earth.^ 

Study  leisurely,  with  concentrated  attention, 
it  was  said,  picking  out  the  salient  points  as 
you  go.  This  last  is  analysis ;  it  involves  per- 
ception; it  gives  the  mind  the  concrete  data, 
facts,  and  the  important  details;  it  eliminates 
vagueness  from  one's  knowledge,  ''blindness" 
from  your  general  notions,  as  Kant  would  say. 
By  dividing  you  have  conquered. 

Then,  at  the  end  of  your  material,  review  the 
whole  in  mind  and  formulate  your  concept  of  the 
3  Synthe-  Subject.  Reach  a  general  notion  con- 
^^®  cerning  the  essence  and  drift  of  what  you 

have  studied.  Synthesize  your  percepts.  This 
means  intellectual  grasp  and  vision ;  your  mind 
has  risen  above  its  material  and  sees  it  whole. 

*  H.  C.  King,  Eational  Living,  pp.  134-135. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  147 

Finally,  recur  to  your  initial  need  with  the 
question,  How  does  this  material  satisfy  my 
need?     How  can  I  apply  my  knowl- 

4.  Apply 

edge  of  this  subject?  What  use  can 
I  make  of  it  ?  How  can  it  be  made  to  function 
in  my  life  or  in  the  lives  of  others?  This  is 
application,  practice,  "doing  the  truth."  With 
this  final  stage  you  have  completed  the  cir- 
cuit; you  began  in  need  and  you  end  in  its 
satisfaction.  You  are  then  ready  to  continue 
acting  in  the  light  of  knowledge  acquired  by 
study  until  a  new  need  arises,  which  halts  your 
process,  and  sends  you  back  again  to  your 
study.  To  act  without  study  is  to  be  *'the 
man-in-the-street " ;  to  study  without  acting 
is  to  be  ** academic" ;  to  act  till  you  need  light, 
to  study  till  you  get  it,  then  to  act  in  the 
light  of  study  till  you  need  more  light,  is  to  be 
a  complete  student ;  it  is  also  to  be  a  complete 
man,  "thoroughly  furnished  unto  all  good 
works." 

The  four  factors  emphasized  in  the  study  of 
a  text,  viz.  initial  sense  of  need,  analysis,  syn- 
thesis, and    application,    naturally    cannot    all 


148  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

be  utilized  in  the  mastery  of  a  single  assign- 
ment of  a  few  pages,  nor  is  this  necessary.  It 
now  appears  that  Herbart  himself  never  intended 
the  formal  steps  to  be  followed  in  each  lesson, 
but  applied  only  to  considerable  bodies  of 
material. 

At  this  point  we  pass  from  the  question  of 

how  to  study  to  the  related  one,  train- 
Training 

Pupils  to     ing   pupils    to    study.     This    is    the 

study  .      ,  . 

practical  question  for  which  our  analy- 
sis of  the  process  of  study  has  been  preparing. 
It  is  not  an  easy  thing  to  learn  to  study. 
Real     difficulties     are     in     the    way. 

Difficulties  ^  *^ 

in  Learning  Among    these    we    may    mention    (1) 

to  study 

the  complexity  of  the  process  itself; 
(2)  the  many  outside  interests  of  children, 
which,  however,  if  rightly  correlated  with  school 
work  may  become  a  wonderful  aid;  (3)  the 
tendency  of  children  to  get  what  the  teacher 
wants  in  the  quickest  way  possible,  especially 
by  asking  somebody  that  knows  instead  of 
finding  out  for  themselves;  (4)  the  general 
wearisomeness  of  school  duties,  which,  however, 
can  be  largely  met  by  re-shaping  those  duties 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  149 

to  meet  the  real  situations  of  life;  (5)  the 
failure  in  the  assigning  of  work  to  make  the 
problems  definite  and  to  suggest  how  to  go 
about  the  solution;  (6)  as  previously  indi- 
cated, poor  mechanical  aids  and  poor  physical 
conditions  in  home  and  school  for  study;  (7) 
poor  teaching,  which  does  not  provide  proper 
stimulus  to  study,  and  (8)  lack  of  time  provided 
for  study  in  home  and  school. 

At  what  age  should  we  begin  to  train  chil- 
dren to  study?    As  soon  as  a  child  can  ask 

a    question.     This   is    none   too    soon 

^     ^  ^  At  What 

to  begin.     The  question  asked  by  the  Age  should 

Children 

child  is  the  sign  that  a  problem  is  al-  be  Taught 
ready  being  faced.  Children  learn 
more  in  the  way  of  skill  and  adaptation  to 
environment  in  the  first  five  years  of  life  than 
during  any  succeeding  period  of  five  years.  In 
answering  questions,  give  information  when 
you  have  to  do  so,  but  when  you  can,  call  the 
attention  of  the  questioner  to  certain  facts  that 
will  enable  him  to  answer  his  own  question. 
This  is  the  beginning  of  training  in  observation, 
collection  of   facts,   and  judgment,   which  are 


150  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

of  the  essence  of  all  study.  With  advancing 
years  through  kindergarten,  primary  grades, 
grammar  grades,  secondary  school,  college,  grad- 
uate or  professional  school,  research  work  in 
life,  the  same  method  of  study  holds,  with 
ever  deepening  and  widening  significance;  a 
question  put  to  oneself,  the  gathering  of  data, 
its  sifting  and  ordering,  the  testing  of  an  hy- 
pothesis, final  verification,  then  the  use  of  the 
truth  so  gained.  Children  of  all  ages  should 
be  taught  to  study,  but  the  problems  must  be 
selected  and  simplified  to  suit  the  age  and 
capacity  of  individual  children.  It  was  a  wise 
word  that  Dr.  Arnold  said  to  the  Rugby  boys : 
*'You  come  here  not  to  read,  but  to  learn  how 
to  read." 

This  matter  of  teaching  pupils  how  to  study 
has  been  agitating  the  minds  of  American 
A  Report  educators  more  or  less  for  some 
Quoted  twenty  years.  Let  me  quote  from  a 
report  on  "When  and  Where  shall  the  Child 
Study  .f^"  made  several  years  ago  by  a  special 
committee  to  the  then  City  Superintendent  of 
Cincinnati,  W.  H.  Morgan,  as  follows : 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  151 

Nothing  shows  the  weakness  of  our  system  more  than 
the  absence  of  a  time  for  intelligent  study  in  school  under 
the  guidance  of  the  teacher.  Programmes  set  apart  a  time 
for  everything  else  but  this  essential  thing.  The  pupil  at  a 
given  time  must  be  shown  how  to  study  in  the  presence  and 
by  direction  of  the  teacher.  In  what  does  this  "how" 
consist  ?  It  is  partly  in  the  way  to  analyze  the  subject,  to 
see  its  prominent  points,  the  consecutive  order  of  thought 
in  it,  the  meaning  of  its  language,  the  method  of  finding 
supplementary  information,  etc.  There  must  be  a  divi- 
sion of  classes,  a  time  set,  instruction  in  the  way  to  study, 
and  a  set  habit  of  study.  We  have  too  much  recitation 
and  help  and  too  little  silent  study  in  school  by  pupils 
who  have  been  prepared  for  it.  Let  the  pupil  show  you 
occasionally  his  way  of  studying  to  see  if  he  has  acquired 
any.i 

In  accord  with  the  suggestion  of  this  quo- 
tation we  may  indicate  several  ways  in  which 
teachers  may  train  pupils  in  the  art  study  with 
of  study.  First  of  all,  teachers  must  t^ePupUs 
study  with  the  pupils  and  let  the  pupils  see 
how  they  themselves  would  set  about  master- 
ing the  problem  or  assignment.  Get  pupils  to 
help  you  in  the  conduct  of  the  recitation  itself ; 
as,  for  instance,  in  stating  the  aim  of  the  lesson, 
selecting  the  main  points,  condensing  the  truths 

» Rep.  U.  S.  Com.  Ed.,  1890-91,  Vol.  2,  p.  1050. 


152  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

of  the  whole  into  a  single  statement,  and  seeing 
the  bearing  of  the  lesson  on  living.  For  ac- 
quainting pupils  with  the  method  of  study, 
there  should  be  a  study  period  in  the  schedule ; 
where  such  a  period  is  lacking  a  portion  of  the 
recitation  period  itself  may  be  profitably  given 
to  learning  how  to  study.  Comenius^  wrote: 
"It  is  therefore  cruelty  on  the  part  of  a  teacher 
if  he  set  his  pupils  work  to  do  without  first 
explaining  it  to  them  thoroughly,  or  showing 
them  how  it  should  be  done,  and  if  he  do 
not  assist  them  in  their  first  attempts;  or 
if  he  allow  them  to  toil  hard,  and  then  loses 
his  temper  if  they  do  not  succeed  in  their 
endeavors." 

One  of  the  criticisms  passed  by  John  Stuart 
Mill  on  the  methods  used  by  his  father  in 
teaching  him  was:  "Though  he  told  me  how 
to  read,  he  never  showed  me  by  doing  it  him- 
self." Example,  then,  is  the  first  way  by  which 
we  should  teach  our  pupils  how  to  study. 

Recurring  to  the  four  elements  in  the  study 
process,  how  shall  we  bring  the  sense  of  the 

»  The  Great  Didactic,  Keatinge,  Ed.,  p.  138.     London,  1907. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  15S 

problem  home  to  our   pupils?     Whether   they 
are    studying    at    home,   or  during    the   study 
period,    or    during    a    portion    of    the  Helping 
recitation  period  devoted  to  study,  first  g^^g^  ^^ 
of   all  they  must  sense   the   problem.  Problem 
Ways  in  which  this  can  be  done  are :   state  the 
assignment  in  the  form  of  a  problem;    suggest 
its  interest  and  value;   show  its  relation  to  the 
lives   the   pupils   are   living ;     indicate  how   it 
grows  out  of  what  has  just  preceded.     Studying 
is  not  learning  pages,  but  mastering  problems. 
How  shall  we  assist  pupils  properly  in  hunt- 
ing   for    the    solution    of    the    problem?     By 
giving  them  a  series  of  questions  to 

Hunting 

answer,  each  of  which  leads  up  to  the  for  the 

...        Solution 

succeeding  one,  and  the  whole  list 
bringing  them  clearly  in  sight  of  the  solution 
sought.  By  bringing  fact  after  fact  to  attention 
in  such  an  order  that  the  answer  to  the  ques- 
tion sought  is  clear  to  those  with  mental  eyes  to 
see.  By  developing  the  material  so  clearly, 
concretely,  vividly,  and  analytically  before  them 
that  it  is  mastered  point  by  point  and  the  way 
is  prepared  for  a  general  view  of  the  whole. 


154  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

How   shall   we  assist  pupils   in  recognizing, 
fixing,  and  retaining  the  solution?     It  is  gen- 
erally reached  as  a  concept  or  general 

Recogniz-  .  .  _ 

ingthe        notion  or  a  principle.     It  grows  out 

Solution  »      1  T  T      .  .    1 

oi  the  preceding  step.  It  is  mainly 
a  matter  of  seeing  the  material  as  a  whole. 
One  way  is  to  train  pupils  in  the  making  of 
outlines,  either  on  the  board  or  in  their  note- 
books. Another  way  is  to  train  them  in 
summarizing  in  a  single  statement  or  two 
the  truth  of  the  whole.  Another  way  is  the 
formation  and  test  of  hypotheses.  The  solu- 
tion usually  comes  as  an  intuitive  flash  when 
the  situation  has  been  properly  analyzed  and 
presented. 

And  how  shall  we  help  the  pupils  to  use  the 
solution  found  .^  Mainly  by  assigning  more 
Using  the  Problems  of  the  same  general  nature 
Solution  requiring  a  similar  solution.  Also,  by 
going  beyond  the  text  and  relating  knowledge 
to  life.  For  example,  in  geography,  pupils 
should  draw  maps  of  their  own  community, 
village,  or  city.  In  civics,  they  should  learn 
the  names  of  the  officers  of  town,  state,  and 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  155 

nation.  Further,  they  should  catalogue  the 
domestic  and  social  needs  of  the  environment 
in  which  their  school  is  placed,  as  they  can  see 
them,  and  then  inquire  what  school  children 
can  do  to  meet  those  needs.  Such  a  problem  is 
differently  faced  by  every  pupil.  And  such  a 
method  of  study  will  do  more  than  any  other 
one  thing  to  remove  that  academic  aloofness 
which  is  the  bane  of  American  teaching. 

In  immediate  conjunction  with  the  foregoing 
thought,  let  me  urge  that  teachers  suggest  the 
uses  in  the  homes  to  which  the  lessons  secure  the 
of    the  school   may  be   put;    for    ex-  Lessons  in 
ample,  in  the  matter  of  school  decora-  *^®  ^°°^® 
tions,  sanitation,  hygiene,  correct  speech,  decla- 
mation, recitation,  deportment,  etc.     For  most 
school  children  the  home  is  the  natural  institu- 
tion of  life  in  which  first  to  use  what  they  learn 
in  school.     Such  use  naturally  involves  the  co- 
operation of  parents  with  teachers,  and  a  part 
of  the  work  of  the  teacher  in  training  pupils  to 
study  is  the  enlisting  of  the  aid  of  the  parents. 
In  this  connection  I  beg  the  privilege  of  quoting 
McMurry  again. 


156  THREE   SCHOOL  ARTS 

Parents  are  more  bent  upon  obtaining  results  and 

getting  rid  of  their  children  —  so  far  as  school 

and  the         work  is  concerned  —  than  are  teachers,  so  that 

School  Re-   the  duties  assigned  to  them  [the  parents]  should 
quirements  ,      -  j     i?        •       i      i.         x 

be  few  and  of  a  simple  character. 

There  are  some  important  things  for  parents  to  do, 
however.  They  should  take  pains  to  provide  proper 
physical  surroundings  for  home  study,  including  quiet, 
proper  light  and  temperature.  They  should  exert  an 
influence  in  the  direction  of  regular  hours,  of  a  short  period 
of  relaxation  immediately  before  and  after  meals  and 
before  bedtime,  and  of  some  variety  of  occupation  during 
the  longer  periods  of  study,  so  that  fatigue  may  be  avoided. 
In  addition,  they  should  stimulate  their  children  by 
bringing  pressure  to  bear  on  the  lazy  ones,  by  "hearing 
lessons  "  now  and  then,  and,  above  all,  by  asking  questions 
that  call  for  a  review  of  facts  as  well  as  for  their  use  in 
conversation.  They  may  give  some  help ;  but  if  they  do, 
they  should  by  all  means  avoid  falling  into  disputes  about 
method.  The  child  is  right  in  preferring  to  do  a  thing  in 
the  teacher's  way,  for  it  is  to  the  teacher  that  he  is  finally 
responsible;  and  parents  ought  to  be  broad  enough  to 
try  to  follow  the  teacher's  plan.  They  can  help  their 
children  most  by  showing  concern  for  them,  really  inspect- 
ing their  written  work  instead  of  merely  pretending  to, 
and  otherwise  manifesting  genuine  interest  in  their  tasks.' 

We  saw  above  that  studying,  training  pupils 
to  study,  and  good  teaching  were  reciprocally 
related.      Right   study   re-acts    beneficially   on 

1  F.  M.  McMuny,  How  to  Study,  pp.  305-306.     Boston.  1909. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  157 

teaching,  and  good  teaching  is  an  aid  to  right 
study.     In  this  connection   we   cannot    go   at 
length  into  the  large  question  of  what  q^q^ 
is  involved  in  good  teaching,  but  it  is  ^'^^^ 
necessary  to  point  out  that  the  four  ^^^^ 
phases   of  the   study  process   and   of  training 
pupils  to  study  can  and  should  also  reappear 
here.     We  may  teach  by  telling  stories,  by  the 
question-and-answer  method,  by  the  conference 
method,  or  by  the  lecture  method ;   still  in  each 
of  them  we  have  (1)  the  problem,  or  situation ; 
(2)  the  hunt,  or  development ;    (3)  the  solution, 
or  climax ;  and  (4)  the  application,  or  conclusion. 

In  the  very  form  of  the  story  itself  we  found 
the   beginning,   the   development,  the  lousing 
climax,  and  the  ending,  relating  it  to  ^^  story 
all  drama  and  also  to  the  four  phases  of  the 
study  process. 

In    good    questioning     likewise,    when     this 
method  is  used,  we  should  first  bring  out  the 
problem,    then    its    phases,    then    the  j^^  q^^^ 
solution,    then    the    application.      Es-  ^^^^^ 
pecially  in  questioning  should  the  topic  or  the 
problem,  not  so  many  pages  of  the  text,  be  the 


158  THREE   SCHOOL  ARTS 

object  of  our  questioning.  The  kind  of  ques- 
tions we  ask  helps  to  set  the  pace  for  the  kind 
of  study  we  secure.  Go  behind  the  lesson  as- 
signed into  the  causes,  methods,  and  bearing 
of  the  material.  Why  ?  How  ?  For  what  pur- 
pose? The  bearing  on  life?  Such  questions 
cannot  be  fully  answered  from  a  knowledge  of 
the  text,  but  require  thought  and  reflection, 
elicit  a  personal  reaction,  and  so  quicken  a 
personal  interest.  Pupils  may  also  very  prop- 
erly be  induced  to  ask  questions  themselves  of 
the  teacher  and  of  each  other. 

Likewise  in  using  other  teaching  methods,  as 
the  lecture,  or  the  conference,  sometimes  called 
inLectur-  ^^^  seminar,  we  will  find  it  best  and 
"^^  most  natural  to  put  the  problem  for- 

ward first,  then  the  elucidation  of  its  phases, 
then  the  proposed  solution,  then  the  resulting 
action.  In  this  way  we  teach  as  the  mind 
learns  when  it  learns  best. 

The  psychology  of  learning  indicates  that 
the  mind  first  intuits  vague  wholes,  then  ana- 
lyzes these  wholes  into  parts,  then  integrates 
the  whole.     The  procedure  is  from  the  vague 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  l5d 

whole,  to  detailed  analysis,  to  clear  synthesis. 
So  we  teach  reading  by  the  word  method;  the 
word  is  first  a  vague  whole  recognized 
as  a  unity,  then  later  the  letters  com-  choiogy  of 

Learning 

posing  it  are  learned  by  name  and 
sound,  then  finally  the  word  is  recognized  as  a 
clear  and  integrated  whole.  The  process  of 
evolution  itself,  as  described  by  Spencer,  very 
well  fits  in  with  the  psychology  of  learning,  viz. 
from  homogeneity,  through  diflFerentiation,  to 
integration. 

We  have  thus  seen  how  good  teaching,  what- 
ever the  method  used,  reacts  beneficially  on  the 
art  of  studying,  illustrates  and  emphasizes  in  fact 
the  same  four  features,  though  no  one  would  say 
pupils  can  learn  how  to  study,  without  being 
trained  to  study,  merely  by  being  well  taught. 

There  are  several  additional  features  of  good 
teaching  which  also  assist  pupils  in  learning  how 
to  study.  These  include  the  right  attitude 
toward  texts,  variety,  right  examinations,  the 
placing  of  responsibility  on  pupils,  and  the 
studious  teacher,  to  each  of  which  we  will  give 
brief  attention. 


160  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

Students  should  be  given  the  right  attitude 
toward  their  texts.  A  text-book  is  not  material 
Right  to   be   memorized   unquestioningly   as 

toward^  it  stands,  but  to  be  comprehended. 
Texts  thought  about,  tested,  accepted  or 
rejected,  and  utilized.  A  text  is  the  consensus 
of  opinion  regarding  the  matter  treated  as 
sensed  and  reported  by  one  person.  ^'History" 
does  not  record  anything,  but  historians  do. 
The  selection  of  texts  is  a  most  important 
matter ;  one  must  have  regard  not  simply  to  the 
subject  to  be  covered,  but  also  the  manner  of 
presentation  and  to  the  probable  reaction  of 
the  class  upon  the  text.  Some  texts  will  al- 
most teach  themselves;  others  will  provoke 
the  resentment  of  both  teacher  and  class.  In 
general  an  acceptable  text  is  attractively  bound, 
well  printed  in  large  type  on  unglazed  paper, 
with  lines  far  enough  apart  and  the  page  not  so 
wide  as  to  require  excessive  lateral  motion  of 
the  eyes,  long  enough  to  allow  concrete  illus- 
tration as  well  as  abstract  statements  with- 
out becoming  thereby  prolix,  with  an  impartial, 
unbiassed,  undogmatic,  and  scholarly  presenta- 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  161 

tion  of  the  field  covered,  and  withal,  in  good 
prose  style.  It  were  desirable  for  pupils  to 
own  their  own  texts,  to  study  them  with  pencil 
in  hand,  to  mark  important  points,  to  annotate 
the  margins,  to  criticise,  and  to  summarize. 
In  these  days  of  public  libraries  and  the  social 
provision  by  the  school  of  the  texts  of  the 
pupils,  the  custom  might  helpfully  be  introduced 
of  inserting  loose  thin  blank  sheets  between  the 
pages  to  serve  the  same  purposes. 

Give  to  the  learning  mind  many  points  of 
view  of  the  same  material,  approach  the  lesson 
from  several   diflPerent  angles   at  dif- 

^  ,      UtUize 

ferent   times.     Narrate   the   lesson   in  Many 

Modes  of 

the  third  person,  tell  a  similar  ex-  Presenta- 
perience  in  the  first  person,  illus- 
trate it  with  pictures,  build  something  it  de- 
scribes, dramatize  it,  make  some  practical  use 
of  it.  Set  the  imagination  of  children  to  work 
that  in  their  own  way  they  may  envisage  the 
whole.  By  the  use  of  these  means  study  real- 
izes and  vitalizes  its  object. 

Utilize  the  right  kind  of  examination.  Some 
students  will  study  more  under  the  stimulus  of 


162  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

an  approaching  examination  than  at  any  other 
time.  The  examination  should  not  be  made  a 
Examine  bugbear  in  the  temple  of  wisdom,  nor 
Aright  should  it  be  held  in  itself  as  a  whip 
over  students  before  the  time.  The  examina- 
tion is  the  opportunity  of  the  students  to  re-act 
in  a  large  way  upon  the  material  covered,  their 
last  time  for  full  self-expression  in  the  field 
treated.  The  character  of  the  examination  it- 
self should  emphasize  correct  ideals  in  study, 
not  stuffing  the  mind  for  a  future  relieving  dis- 
gorgement, but  assimilating  knowledge  for  use. 
An  examination  should  test  ability  as  well  as 
memory;  thus  it  should  contain  new  questions 
and  problems,  it  should  allow  free  play  for  criti- 
cism, and  it  should  give  the  student  enough 
range  for  him  to  show  where  he  is  strong  in- 
stead of  seeking  to  find  his  weak  points.  The 
pupil  should  prepare  for  an  examination  in  the 
same  spirit  in  which  he  habitually  studies,  viz. 
to  know  in  order  that  he  may  be  able  to  do. 

Train  pupils  to  study  at  their  own  initia- 
tive, not  always  at  yours.  Unless  study  be  a 
voluntary   process,  becoming   finally   habitual. 


I 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  163 

it   cannot    outlast    school    life.      The    indeter- 
minate  lesson   may   help   pupils   to   study,  as 

the  indeterminate  sentence  helps  pris- 

^    ^        Place  Re- 
oners  to  control  themselves.     Both  the  sponsibiuty 

on  Pupils 

school  and  the  home  must  place  some 
responsibility  upon  the  children  themselves  in 
this  matter  of  study.  After  all,  it  really  rests 
with  them  whether  they  become  masters  in 
science  and  art  or  not.  You  can  compel  the 
eye  to  look  at  the  book,  but  you  cannot  compel 
the  mind  to  attend.  Children  should  be  re- 
quired to  study  a  minimal  amount  of  time,  if 
they  have  to  be  required,  and  should  be  privi- 
leged to  study  only  so  much  more;  such  a 
minimal  requirement  and  maximal  permission 
leaves  them  a  measure  of  freedom  and  respon- 
sibility. 

Finally,  the  teacher  who  would  train  pupils 
to   study   must   be   himself   a   student.     Show 
yourself  as  teacher  to  be  a  true  stu-  T^e 
dent,  always  finding  out  new  things,  '^^^^^l^ 
always   using  them,  having  a  many-  student 
sided    interest,    never    appearing    dogmatic    or 
irritated    at    the    expression    of    a    difference 


164  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

of  opinion,  exemplifying  the  best  methods 
of  accomplishment,  and  enjoying  the  life  of 
study. 

Expect  the  same  from  your  students.  Work 
for  your  pupils  and  expect  them  to  work  for 
you.  They  will,  if  the  work  you  assign  them 
is  obviously  putting  them  forward,  meeting 
their  interest  and  satisfying  their  needs.  The 
teacher  who  does  for  his  pupils  what  he  wants 
them  to  do  for  him  will  have  little  cause  to 
complain  of  results.  And  by  and  by  a  com- 
pany of  young  scholars  whose  enthusiasm  was 
quickened  at  his  altar-fire  will  rise  up  to  do 
him  honor.  America  has  furnished  at  least 
two  rather  prominent  examples  of  this  truth  in 
the  persons  of  Professor  Garman  at  Amherst 
and  Professor  James  at  Harvard. 

The  German  teachers  impress  both  their  pu- 
pils and  visitors  to  their  classrooms  with  their 
scholarly    mastery    of    their    subjects. 

Herbart  on 

the  The   thoroughness   and  profundity   of 

German  scholarship  is  without  doubt 

partly  due  to  the  contagious  influence  on  the 

pupils  of  teachers  so  capable  in  their  subjects. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  165 

Miinsterberg  ^  recalls  this  impression  of  his  early 
teachers  in  Germany  above  all  others.  And  on 
this  point  Herbart  ^  said  :  '*Now  the  right  kind 
of  example  is  wanting,  which  the  teacher  should 
set  —  one  of  reading,  thinking,  writing,  that 
implies  complete  absorption  in  the  subject. 
And  yet  it  is  this  example  concretely  illustrating 
how  to  take  hold  of  the  subject,  how  to  present 
it,  and  how  to  associate  it  with  related  subjects, 
which  effects  the  best  results  in  good  instruction." 
In  the  light  of  our  study  of  the  art  of  study, 
we  may  draw  certain  conclusions  affecting  our 
general  educational  views,  viz.  (1)  it  conse- 
is  better  for  the  pupil  with  his  activi-  ^"ptesof^' 
ties   and   needs   to   be   central  rather  '^^^^ching 

aud 

than  the  teacher ;  (2)  it  is  better  that  studying 
texts  should  be  written  from  the  standpoint  of 
children  learning  how  to  study  than  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  logical  exposition  of  the  sub- 
ject; (3)  it  is  better  to  judge  our  methods  of 
teaching  by  the  way  in  which  pupils  attack  a 
problem   than   by   the   amount   of   memorized 

» H.  MUnsterberg.  "School  Reform,"  AU.  Mo.,  May,  1900. 
*  Herbart,  Outlines  of  Educational  Doctrine,  p.  105.     (Lange  and 
De  Garmo.)     N.  Y.,  1909. 


166  THREE  SCHOOL  ARTS 

information  they  can  show;  (4)  it  is  better  to 
train  pupils  to  study  than  to  rely  on  good  teach- 
ing alone  to  achieve  the  result  desired ;  (5)  it 
is  better  to  form  right  habits  of  study  than  to 
know  many  facts ;  (6)  it  is  better  for  teachers 
and  pupils  to  study  together  than  for  teachers  to 
hear  pupils  "recite"  what  they  have  somehow 
acquired  by  themselves ;  (7)  it  is  better  to  view 
the  human  mind  as  a  tool  for  discovering  needed 
truth  than  as  a  repository  of  information. 

It  must  not  be  inferred  from  the  foregoing 
that  children  who  are  learning  how  to  study 
need  not  know  anything.  On  the  contrary, 
they  will  know  what  they  know  in  a  better 
way,  because  it  has  been  better  acquired.  In 
fact,  when  we  sum  up  the  results  of 

The  Five 

Restiits  of    studying  as  one  should,  they  include 

study 

(1)  certain  standards  of  procedure  to 
which  to  conform  in  attacking  a  problem,  cer- 
tain ideals  of  mental  approach  to  difficult 
matters;  (2)  certain  mental  development  of 
habits  and  skill  in  meeting  and  handling  new 
problems ;  (3)  certain  acquisition  of  informa- 
tion, what  we  have  found  out  by  solving  so 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  167 

many  problems ;  (4)  let  us  hope  also,  on  the 
individual  side,  the  gradual  perfecting  of  con- 
duct, bringing  it  into  conformity  as  rapidly  as 
possible  with  the  truth  discovered ;  and  (5) 
let  us  hope  also,  on  the  social  side,  the  increase 
of  our  effectiveness,  by  which  we  become  more 
useful  to  more  people.  As  Karl  the  Great 
wrote  to  the  abbots  of  the  monasteries:  *'It 
is  without  doubt  better  to  do  than  to  know,  but 
it  is  necessary  to  know  in  order  to  be  able  to  do." 

Closely  connected  with  the  question  of  how 
to  study  are  three  others,  a  brief  mention  of 
which  may  prove  welcome  to  some  readers, 
viz.  how  to  master  a  new  book,  how  to  make 
notes,  and  how  to  write  a  paper  on  some  topic. 
These  matters  are  constantly  coming  up  in  the 
lives  of  teachers  and  students. 

In  mastering  a  new  book,  if  you  are  reading 
for  the  sake  of  the  literature  or  because  you 
are  to  be  examined  upon  its  contents, 

Mastering 

you  will  read  all ;  if,  on  the  other  hand,  a  New 

Book 

you  are  reading  for  facts  to  satisfy  per- 
sonal needs,  you  will  skip  judiciously.     Always 
have  some  definite  purpose  in  view  in   going 


168  THREE   SCHOOL  ARTS 

through  a  new  book.  Consider  the  position 
and  probable  standing  of  the  author  as  an 
authority.  Read  the  preface  to  see  the  at- 
titude of  the  author  toward  his  own  work  and 
to  gauge  his  caUber.  Look  carefully  at  the 
table  of  contents  to  determine  the  scope  of 
the  undertaking  and  the  presence  or  absence  of 
logical  arrangement  in  the  presentation.  Is  it 
a  collection  of  essays  or  a  systematic  develop- 
ment? By  this  time  you  may  have  decided, 
within  ten  minutes,  that  the  book  will  not  re- 
pay your  reading.  If  you  decide  otherwise, 
concentrate  on  the  presentation  of,  and  con- 
clusion on,  the  point  or  points  that  concern  you, 
making  notes  in  the  book,  if  it  is  your  own,  or 
in  your  note-book.  At  the  end,  sum  up  in  a 
few  sentences  your  reaction  upon  the  book  as 
a  whole,  and  put  it  where  it  belongs  on  your 
shelves  for  possible  future  use.  A  book  without 
an  index  loses  half  its  reference  value. 

The  matter  of  note-making  is  a  considerable 
art  in  itself.  Not  industry  so  much  as  judg- 
ment makes  the  good  note-book.  If  we  could 
remember  everything  we  learn  likely  to  prove 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  169 

of  future  use  to  us,  a  note-book  would  not 
be  necessary.  Judgment  appears  in  selecting 
those  things  likely  to  be  forgotten  and 

The 

yet  likely  to  be  wanted.     A  note-book  Making  of 

1  .,  .  .  «  Notes 

IS  not  for  exhibition  nor  for  storage, 
but  for  use.  Put  into  it  the  things  you  do 
not  want  to  escape  you,  the  essential  points, 
not  elaborate  verbatim  quotations,  but  facts 
and  inferences,  good  phrases  and  summaries. 
Especially  include  exact  references  to  author, 
title,  page,  with  place  and  date  of  publication. 
And  by  some  such  device  as  a  loose-leaf  sys- 
tem keep  pages  together  that  belong  together. 
When  you  come  to  write,  your  notes  are  your 
main  reliance,  in  case  you  are  not  writing  fiction. 
"When  you  come  to  write."  It  is  an  im- 
potent feeling  that  leads  one  to  stare  at  a 
blank  sheet  of  white  paper  with  one's  -vv^ritinga 
theme  at  the  top  and  not  an  idea  in  ^*p®^ 
one's  mind.  Such  a  beginning  is  wrong. 
Rather,  carry  your  theme  for  days  in  your  sub- 
consciousness while  it  grows,  and  while  you 
note  casual  references  to  it.  Jot  down  thoughts 
regarding  it  as  they  rise  in  consciousness ;   such 


170  THREE   SCHOOL  ARTS 

thoughts  are  really  incubated  by  the  brain  as- 
sociations formed  by  all  your  past  study  and 
experience.  Then,  order  these  thoughts  of  your 
own  logically  on  paper  as  an  outline.  Then, 
read  all  you  possibly  can  from  good  authorities 
on  the  subject,  collecting  also  material  from 
your  own  note-books.  Then  rearrange  your 
outline,  introducing  this  new  material  where  it 
belongs.  Then,  finally,  when  your  brain  is 
rested  and  your  mind  unharassed,  write  your- 
self out  with  such  power  of  thought  and  such 
finish  of  form  as  you  can  command.  By  the 
use  of  some  such  procedure  as  this  you  will 
always  be  original  to  a  degree,  you  will  always 
have  something  to  say  in  the  body  of  your  com- 
position, you  will  embody  logic  in  your  pres- 
entation, and  you  may  come  even  to  experience 
the  highest  pleasure,  —  that  of  artistic  self- 
expression.  In  any  case  you  will  not  have  lost 
your  individuality  and  you  can  say  with  the 
English  philosopher,  Hobbes,  "If  I  had  read 
as  much  as  other  men,  I  should  still  be  as  ig- 
norant as  they."  It  is  due  yourself  not  to 
quote  much,   lest  you   appear  the  ass  in  the 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  171 

lion's  skin ;  it  is  due  your  sources  that  you  cite 
them  frequently  and  exactly  ;  and  it  is  due  both 
to  yourself  and  to  them  that  you  never  quote 
without  quotation  marks.  Finally,  regard  writ- 
ing as  an  opportunity,  not  as  a  task,  —  an  oppor- 
tunity to  use  what  you  have  learned,  and  so  to 
know  it  better,  to  keep  it  longer,  and  perchance 
even  to  give  some  pleasure  and  profit  to  others. 

Strictly  speaking,  I  suppose  the  art  of  writing 
a  paper  has  little  to  do  with  the  art  of  study ; 
but  it  may  be  observed,  in  justification  of  the 
paragraphs  above,  that  it  has  a  good  deal  to 
do  with  the  practical  use  of  the  results  of  study. 

Life  itself  is  a  vast  school,  and  its  lessons  we 
are  all  set  to  learn  by  experience  and  study. 
Living  is  a  process  of  doing  illumined 

Gtiiding 

and    reenf  orced    by    thinking.      Since  the  study 

.  .       .  ,  .       Process 

study  IS  thus  a  contmumg  element  m 
the  life  process,  it  is  important  that  we  guide  it 
with   the  proper  patience  and  perse- 
verance and  otherwise  aright.     Do  first  Things 

First  1 

the  thing  that  needs  to  be  done  first ; 

face  all  your  immediate  duties  squarely  and  select 

the   most  pressing  one  for  first  performance; 


172  THREE   SCHOOL  ARTS 

it  may  be  one  that  has  waited  long;  and  it 
will  certainly  require  effort  to  do  it  in  the  face 
of  the  pleasure  afforded  human  nature  in  doing 
*' something  else,"  good  perhaps  in  itself,  but  not 
requiring  immediate  performance.  There  is  no 
future  day  when  it  will  be  quite  so  easy  to  do 
a  present  duty  as  to-day. 

Attack  a  problem  that  is  hard  for  you.  It 
jj^^  means  the  growth  of  mental  grasp.     To 

Problems  j^  always  Only  the  things  easy  for  you 
to  do  is  the  death-knell  of  the  mind's  power. 

Read  the  great  books,  —  those  that  make 
a  difference  in  your  thinking,  feeling,  and  act- 
Great  ^^^ '  ^^^  example,  the  writings  of  Des- 
Books  cartes  and  Locke,  referred  to  at  the 
end  of  this  chapter,  on  the  very  topic  of  study. 

Watch  the  signs  of  fatigue.^  It  does  not  pay 
to  study  when  your  brain  or  body  or  both  are 
Avoid  ^^^  ^^  good  condition.  When  you 
Fatigue  fggj  yQ^  cannot  quit,  it  is  already 
past  time  to  quit.  The  extra  hour  beyond  the 
fatigue  limit  demands  more  than  a  normal 
hour's  energy;    besides,  it  fills  the  body  with 

*  Cf.  Mosso,  Fatigue. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  178 

toxic  acids  from  whose  deleterious  effects  you 
cannot  recover  in  a  night.  Always  stop  in 
time  not  to  suffer  to-morrow,  viewing  your 
task  as  that  of  a  lifetime,  not  as  that  of  a  day. 
Do  not  let  yourself  be  overburdened  through 
your  desire  and  willingness  to  do  all  the  good 
you  can  in  the  world.     There  is  also 

*^  ...  Do  Much, 

a  duty  at  a  certain  point  discoverable  not  Many 

Things 

by  you,  as  Horace  Bushnell  said,  of 

"not  doing  any  more  good."     But  be  thorough 

in  what  you  do  undertake  and  so  avoid  what 

Dean  Hodges  calls  "the  immorality  of  second 

best." 

You  must  also  treat  your  body  right.  We 
are  rather  souls  with  bodies  as  instruments, 
than  bodies  with  souls  as  feeling-  Regard  the 
centres.  Care  for  your  body  as  you  ^^y^icai 
would  for  your  trusty  servant  whose  very  life 
is  to  do  your  bidding.  This  suggestion  harks 
back  to  "the  physical  conditions  of  study" 
described  above. 

Finally,  love  your  study.  A  life  of  study  or 
of  listless  existence  is  behind  every  opinion  we 
express,    every    piece    of    work    we    do.      The 


174  THREE   SCHOOL  ARTS 

rewards  of  the  teacher's  profession  are  not 
silver  and  gold.  They  include  the  hearts  of 
Love  your  ^^^  students,  our  long  vacations  with 
^°'^  opportunities  for  recreation  and  travel, 
and,  not  least,  what  Professor  Palmer  calls 
"the  life  of  enriching  study." 

Refebences  on  the  Abt  of  Study 

Adams,  J.,  Making  the  Most  of  One's  Mind.    N.  Y.,  1515. 

Bacon,  Francis,  Essays,  *'0f  Studies.'* 

Bacon,  Francis,  Novum  Organum. 

Baglet,  W.  C,  The  Educative  Process.     Chap.  XXI.    N.  Y., 

1906. 
Bagley,  W.  C,  Classroom  Management.     Chap  XIU.    N.  Y., 

1907. 
Bain,  A.,  Practical  Essays.     VII. 
Breslich,  E.  R.,  *' Teaching  High  School  Pupils  How  to  Study," 

The  School  Review,  Oct.,  1912. 
CoLViN,  S.  S.,  The  Learning  Process.     N.  Y.,  1911. 
Cramer,  F.,  Talks  to  Students  on  the  Art  of  Study.     San 

Francisco,  1902. 
Dewey,  J.,  How  We  Think.     N.  Y.,  1910. 
Descartes,      Discourse      on     Method.      Edinburgh,      1897. 

(Veitch  Tr.) 
DuTTON,   S.  T.,  School  Management.     Chap.  XIH.    N.  Y., 

1904. 
Earhart,  Lida  B.,  Teaching  Children  to  Study.     Boston,  1909. 
HiGGiNs,  "Study  Physiologically  Considered,"  Pop.  Sc.  Mo., 

XXIV,  639. 
HiGGiNSON,  T.  W.,  Woman  and  the  Alphabet.    VI.     Boston, 

1900. 
Hill,  "True  Order  of  Study,"  Am,  J.  Ed.,  Vol.  VI,  pp.  180, 

449 ;  Vol.  VII,  pp.  273,  491. 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  176 

Hinsdale,  B.  A.,  The  Art  of  Study.    N.  Y. 

Jones,  Olive  M.,  Teaching  Children  to  Study.    N.  Y. 

KooPMAN,  The  Mastery  of  Books. 

Locke,  J.,  "Of  Study,"  in  Locke  on  Education;    Quick,  Ed. 

Cambridge,  1902. 
McMuRRY,  F.  M.,  How  to  Study.    Boston,  1909. 
McMuRRY,  F.  M.,  "Study,"  Art.   in  Monroe's  Cyclopaedia  of 

Education.     Vol.  V.     N.  Y.,  1913. 
Moore,  J.  G.,  The  Science  of  Study.    N.  Y. 
MiJLLER,  Max,  "How  to  Work,"  in  Last  Essays,     Vol.  I. 
RiCKARD,  G.  E.,  "High  School  Students'  Description  of  their 

Methods  of  Study,"  The  School  Review.     Dec,  1914. 
RiECHENBACH,  "How  to  Study,"  Ediication.XlI :  W. 
RuEDiGER,  W.   C,   "Teaching  Pupils  to  Study,"  Education. 

March,  1909. 
TuKE,  O.  H.,  "Intemperance  in  Study,"  Pop.  Sc.  Mo.,  XVI :  625. 
Woodward,  W.  H.  (Tr.),  Vittorino  da  Feltre,  109-112, 172-178. 

Cambridge,  1905. 

Questions  on  the  Art  of  Studying 

1.  What  are  some  signs  of  a  new  interest  in  studying  ? 

2.  What  is  the   source  of   greatest  waste  in  present-day 
education  ? 

3.  Define  study. 

4.  Give  and  criticise  Hinsdale's  definition  of  study. 

5.  Name  six  general  presuppositions  of  study. 

6.  Why  be  independent  in  studying  ? 

7.  If  study  is  a  habit,  why  should  it  also  be  an  ideal  ? 

8.  Name  three  mechanical  aids  to  study. 

9.  Name  four  physical  conditions  of  study. 

10.  What  are  the  Herbartian  "formal  steps"  in  teaching? 

11.  What  are  some  weaknesses  of  these  steps  as  a  guide  to 
study  ? 

12.  What  are  the  four  phases  of  the  study  process  ?    Illustrate. 
18.   What  elements  may  enter  into  the  hunt  for  the  solution 

of  a  problem  ? 


176  THREE   SCHOOL  ARTS 

14.  Compare  McMurry's  list  of  eight  factors  in  study  with 
the  list  of  four  given  in  the  text. 

15.  What  are  the  four  steps  in  mastering  a  sufficiently  long 
lesson  in  a  text  ? 

16.  What  is  meant  by  studying  leisurely  ? 

17.  Give  several  reasons  why  it  is  not  easy  for  children  to 
learn  to  study. 

18.  How  early  may  children  be  taught  to  study  ? 

19.  By  whom  and  when  should  children  be  taught  to  study  ? 

20.  What  are  the  advantages  of  teachers  studying  with  the 
pupils  ? 

21.  How  may  teachers  help  pupils  in  each  of  the  four  factors 
of  study  ? 

22.  How  should  parents  help  children  study  in  the  home  ? 

23.  Show  how  the  four  factors  of  study  reappear  in   good 
teaching. 

24.  What,  in  brief,  is  the  psychology  of  learning  ? 

25.  What  is  the  right  attitude  toward  texts  ? 

26.  How  does  variety  of  presentation  in  teaching  aid  study  ? 

27.  What  are  the  characteristics  of  a  good  examination  ? 

28.  How  may  we  place  responsibility  on  children  for  study  ? 

29.  What  are  the  good  effects  of  the  teacher  being  also  a 
student  ? 

30.  What  characteristic  of  the  teacher  does  Herbart  emphasize  ? 

31.  What   are    some   principles   of   teaching   and    studying 
growing  out  of  our  discussion  ? 

32.  Name  five  results  of  study. 

33 .  What  are  the  points  to  be  observed  in  mastering  a  new  book  ? 

34.  Describe  a  good  note-book. 

35.  What  is  a  desirable  procedure  in  writing  a  paper? 

36.  In  what  ways  should  we  guide  the  study  process  ? 

Suggestions  for  Further  Study 

1.  Estimate  Bacon's  Essay :  "Of  Studies." 

2.  Give  Locke's  account  of  Study. 

S.  What  are  the  main  principles  in  Descartes*  Discourse  on 
Method? 


THE  ART  OF  STUDYING  177 

4.  Enumerate  the  sources  of  waste  in  modern  education. 

5.  Is  study  a  means  or  an  end  ? 

6.  To  what  extent  are  "the  roots  of  learning  bitter"  ? 

7.  What  difference  would  it  make  if  men  loved  the  truth  ? 

8.  On  what  point  in  philosophy  did  Aristotle  differ  from  Plato  ? 

9.  What  are  the  advantages  and  disadvantages  of  having  a 
weekly  program  of  work  ? 

10.  Herbart's  own  exposition  of  the  formal  steps  of  method. 
(See  his  Outlines  of  Educational  Doctrine.) 

11.  Give  further  illustrations  of  the  four  phases  of  the  study 
process. 

12.  Distinguish  sharply  the  second  and  the  third  of  these 
phases. 

13.  Compare  McMurry's  views  on  "How  to  Study"  with 
Dewey's  on  "How  We  Think." 

14.  Compare  the  four  phases  of  study  with  the  four  adapta- 
tions of  these  in  mastering  a  lesson  in  a  text. 

15.  How  does  the  age  of  pupils  affect  each  of  the  four  factors 
of  study  ? 

16.  Should  schools  give  credit  for  work  done  in  the  home  ? 

17.  To  what  extent  is  good  teaching  an  aid  to  right  study  ? 

18.  Does  the  best  teaching  proceed  first  from  the  whole  to 
the  part  or  from  the  part  to  the  whole  ? 

19.  Name  some  characteristics  of  good  texts. 

20.  Is  it  desirable  to  waive  examinations  in  lieu  of  high 
scholastic  standing  ? 

21.  How  may  teachers  secure  volunteer  work  from  pupils? 

22.  What  may  teachers  do  in  the  way  of  personal  study  for 
themselves  ? 

23.  Describe  some  incorrect  views  of  the  minds  of  children. 

24.  Write  out  your  reaction  on  some  book-  you  have  recently 
read. 

25.  What  are  some  mistakes  in  taking  notes  ? 

26.  Which  is  more  profitable  to  a  pupil,  to  be  taught  how 
to  study,  to  be  told  certain  useful  facts,  or  to  be  examined  in 
what  he  already  is  supposed  to  know  ? 

27.  What  use  can  you  make  of  this  discussion? 

H 


INDEX 


Abelard,  97. 

^sop,  36. 

Alcuin,  93,  121. 

Answers,  86,  97,  99. 

Application,  Mental,  in  study,  121. 

Aristotle,  23,  121,  125,  126,  177. 

Arnold,  Thos.,  150. 

Attention,  65. 

Aurelius,  M.,  125. 

Auxiliary  Question,  68. 

Bacon,  R,  119,  176. 
Bennett,  Arnold,  132. 
Boy  Scouts,  20. 
Brevity,  in  questioning,  85. 
Browning,  R.,  51. 
Bryant,  S.  C,  37,  44. 
Bryce,  James,  144. 
Burroughs,  John,  21. 
Bushnell,  Horace,  173. 

Chesterton,  G.  K.,  38. 

Cheyne,  Canon,  24. 

Cicero,  126. 

Civilization,  and  story- telling,  119. 

Class  management,  65. 

Clearness,  in  questioning,  84. 

Comenius,  J.  A.,  152. 

Definite  questions,  88. 
Deliberation,  in  questioning,  82. 
Descartes,  119,  172,  176. 
Dewey,  J.,  177. 
Dickens,  Charles,  39. 
Difficulties,   in  learning  to  study, 

148. 
Diogenes,  Laertius,  121. 


Dramatizing  stories,  47. 
Du  Bois,  Patterson,  69. 

Eastman,  C.  A.,  33. 

English,  good,  in  answering,  98. 

in  questioning,  85. 
Erasmus,  118. 
Essential  questions,  89. 
Examinational  questions,  77. 
Examinations,  162. 
Expression,  teaching  by,  45. 

Froebel,  20,  29,  46. 

Garman,  C.  E.,  164. 
Gilder,  R.  W.,  29. 
Goethe,  38. 

Good  teaching,  and  study,  157-158. 
Graded  stories,  lists  of,  55-60. 
"Great  Stone  Face,  The,"  27. 
Guiding   the  study   process,    171- 
174. 

Hall,  G.  S.,  34. 

Haslett,  S.  B.,  37,  44. 

Hawthorne,  27. 

Herbart,   148,   164,  165,  175,  176, 

177. 
Herbartian  Formula,  134-135. 
Herodotus,  24. 
Heuristic  Questions,  70. 
Hinsdale,  B.  A.,  120,  175. 
Hobbes,  Thos.,  170. 
Hodges,  Geo.,  173. 
Home,  and  study,  155. 
Homer,  24. 
Hopkins,  Mark,  111,  116. 


170 


180 


INDEX 


How  to  study,  134-148. 
How  to  study  a  text,  143-148. 
Hubbell,  Maj.  W.  S.,  30. 
Humor  in  pupils'  answers,  101. 

Illustrating  stories,  46. 
Independence,  mental,  124. 
Individual  capacity,  91. 
Interests,  many,  123. 

James,  Wm.,  164. 

Jesus,  41,  63,   103,   107-110,   116, 

117,  126. 
Jotham's  parable,  41. 

Kant,  I.,  120,  133,  146. 
Karl  the  Great,  167. 
Kelvin,  Lord,  139. 
King,  H.  C,  145. 

La  Fontaine,  36. 

Lanier,  Sidney,  51. 

Lawyer,  the,  as  questioner,  111. 

Leading  questions,  86. 

Library,  one's  own,  130. 

Lighting,  132. 

Lincoln,  29,  73,  116. 

Locke,  119,  172,  176. 

Logical  questions,  90. 

Mabie,  H.  W.,  50. 

Making  notes,  169. 

Marconi,  138. 

Mark,  H.  T.,  42. 

Mastering  a  new  book,  167-168. 

McMurry,  F.  M.,   141,   142,   155, 

156,  176,  177. 
Mill,  J.  S.,  152. 
Milton,  38,  144. 
Morgan,  W.  H.,  150. 
MuUer,  Max,  129. 
MUnsterberg,  H.,  165. 

Nathan  and  David,  43. 

New  interest  in  studying,  118. 


Oral  and  written  answers,  99. 

Painter,  F.  V.  N.,  51. 

Palmer,  G.  H.,  174. 

Paulsen,  Fr.,  124. 

Personal  magnetism,  40. 

Plato,  62,  63,  104, 106, 125, 126, 177. 

Plutarch,  36,  121. 

Presentation,  161. 

Presuppositions  of  study,  122-129. 

Primitive  man,  31-34. 

Principles  of  teaching,  165. 

Program  of  work,  131. 

Question,  content  of,  87. 

form  of,  84. 

kinds  of,  68. 
Questioner,  91. 
Questioning,  importance  of,  64. 

manner  of,  80. 

purposes  of,  67. 

references  on,  114-115. 
Questions,  general  and  specific,  82. 

on  questioning,  115-117. 

on  studying,  175. 

on  story-telling,  60. 
Quintilian,  95. 

Reactions  of  children  on  stories,  45. 
Readiness  to  answer,  94. 
References,  on  questioning,  114. 

on  story-telling,  53. 

on  study,  174-175. 
Religious  and  moral  education,  34- 

35. 
Repetition,  in  questioning,  8L 
Research,  138. 
Responsibility,  163. 
Re-telling  stories,  46. 
Review  questions,  74. 
Robinson,  J.  H.,  32. 
Rousseau,  96. 

Self-criticism,  96. 

Seton,  Ernest  Thompson,  21. 


INDEX 


181 


Socrates.    62,    63,    103-107.     108. 

109,  110.  116,  117. 
Spencer,  H.,  158. 
Stimulating  questions,  88. 
St.  John,  E.  P.,  26,  28,  37. 
Stories,  illustrations  of,  22. 
Story,  adaptability  of,  36. 

characteristics  of,  37-39. 

defined,  23. 

fact  and  fancy  in,  25. 

form  of,  26. 

how  to  tell  a,  40-44. 

importance  of,  31-37. 

place  of,  in  education,  48. 

revival  of  the,  20. 
Story  Hour,  The,  20. 
Story  Tellers'  League,  The,  20. 
Story  Tellers  Magazine,  The,  20. 
Story-telling,  the  purpose  of,  28. 
Study,  defined,  120-122. 

four  phases  of,  136. 

habit  of,  127. 

how  to  study,  139-141. 

ideal  of.  128. 

life  of.  122. 

mechanical  aids  to,  129-131. 

physical  conditions  of,  131-133. 

results  of,  166. 

with  pupils,  151. 
Suggestions,  for  self -training,  49. 
Sympathy,  in  questioning,  80. 


Teacher,  as  student,  163. 
Teaching,    good,  and   questioning, 

66. 
Temperature,  133. 
Texts,  right  attitude  toward,  160. 
Thomson,  J.  J.,  139. 
Thought-provoking  questions,  90. 
Tobey,  Marian  E.,  55. 
Training  pupils  to  study,  149. 
Truth,  and  freedom,  126. 

its  simplest  vehicle,  34. 

love  of,  125. 
Twain,  Mark,  126. 

Variety  in  questioning,  83. 
Venerable  Bede,  93. 
Ventilation,  133. 

Wagner,  38. 
Washington,  117. 
Waste  in  education,  119. 
Wellman,  F.  L.,  112. 
Wiggin,  K.  D.,  50. 
Wilson,  McLandburgh,  52. 
Writing  a  paper,  169. 
Wyche,  R.  T.,  20. 

Xenophon,  103,  110,  117. 

Ziller,  Tuiskon,  68,  117. 


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T 


HE  following  pages  contain  advertisements  of  a 
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MODERN  PEDAGOGY 


Aspinwall       ....    Outlines  of  the  History  of  Educa- 
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Bagley Classsroom     Management.      Its 

Principles  and  Technique     .     .       1.25 
Craftsmanship  in  Teaching      .     .       i.io 

Educational  Values i.io 

Educative  Process,  The  .     .     .     .       1.25 

School  Discipline 1.25 

Bigelow Sex  Education 1.22 

Bricker Teaching   of  Agriculture  in  the 

High  School 1. 00 

Brown        American  High  School   ....       1.40 

The  Training  of  Teachers  for  Sec- 
ondary Schools  in  Germany  and 

the  United  States 1.25 

Chubb       The  Teaching  of  English  in  Ele- 
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Cubberley      ....    State    and    County    Educational 

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Cubberley  and  Elliott       State  and  County  School  Adminis- 
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Curtis Education  Through  Play  (Educa- 
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Principles  of  Secondary  Education 

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Dresslar     ....    School  Hygiene $1.25 

Button  .....     Social  Phases  of  Education  in  the 

School  and  the  Home     .     .     .     .  1.25 
Eaton  and  Stevens  .     Commercial    Work    and    Training 

for  Girls 1.50 

Farrington  ....    Commercial  Education  in  Germany  i.io 

Foght The  American  Rural  School   .     .     .  1.25 

Rural  Denmark  and  its  Schools  .     .  1.40 
The  Rural  Teacher  and  His  Work  Preparing 

Ganong The  Teaching  Botanist      ....  1.25 

Graves A  History  of  Education.     Vol.  I. 

Before  the  Middle  Ages      .     .     .  i.io 
Vol.  II.    A  History  of  Education 

During  the  Middle  Ages     .     .     .  i.io 

Vol.  III.     Modern  Times  .     .     .     .  i.io 

Great  Educators  of  Three  Centuries  i.io 
Peter  Ramus  and  the  Educational 

Reformation  of  the  i6th  Century  1.25 

A  Students'  History  of  Education    .  1.25 

Halleck Education  of  the  Central  Nervous 

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Hall-Quest     .    .     .    Supervised  Study 1.25 

Hanus Educational  Aims  and  Values     .     .  i.oo 

Modern  School,  A 1.25 

Hart Educational   Resources   of    Village 

and  Rural  Communities    ...  i.oo 
Heatwole    ....     A  History  of  Education  in  Virginia  .  1.25 
Henderson      •    •    .    Principles  of  Education     ....  1.75 
Herrick Meaning  and  Practice  of  Commer- 
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Holtz Principles  and  Methods  of  Teach- 
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Home        Philosophy  of  Education     .     .     .  $1.50 

Psychological  Principles  of  Educa- 
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IdeaUsm  in  Education     .     .     .     .  1.25 
Story-Tellingj    Questioning    and 

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Howerth The  Art  of  Education     ....  i.oo 

Huey Psychology  and  Pedagogy  of  Read- 
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Hummel  and  Hummel    Materials  and  Methods  in  High 

School  Agriculture     .     .     .     .  1.25 
Jessup  and  Cofifman    .     The  Supervision  of  Arithmetic    .  i.io 
Johnson,  Henry      .     .     Teaching  of  History  in  Elemen- 
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Kahn  and  Klein      .     .     Commercial  Education,  Principles 

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Kennedy Fundamentals  in  Methods       .     .  1.25 

Kerschensteiner      .     .    The  Idea  of  the  Industrial  School  .50 
Kilpatrick,  V.  E.      .     .     Departmental   Teaching   in   Ele- 
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Kilpatrick,  W.  B.  Froebel's  Kindergarten  Principles 

Critically  Examined 90 

Kirkpatrick,  E.  A.  .     .     Fundamentals  of  Child  Study      .  0.00 

Lee        Play  in  Education 1.50 

McKeever      ....    Training  the  Girl 1.50 

The  Industrial  Training  of  the  Boy  .50 
MacVannel    ....     Outline  of  a  Course  in  the  Philoso- 
phy of  Education 90 

Monroe Principles  of  Secondary  Education  1.90 

Text-Book  in  the  History  of  Edu- 
cation     1.90 

Syllabus  of  a  Course  of  Study  on 
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Education 50 

Source  Book  in  the  History  of  Edu- 
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Cyclopedia  of  Education,  5  Vols.  25.00 

O'Shea Dynamic  Factors  in  Education    .       1.25 

Linguistic  Development  in  Educa- 
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Pearson Vitalized  School 1.40 

Perry Management  of  a  City  School      .       1.25 

Outlines  of  School  Administration      1.40 
Pyle      .              .    .     .    The  Examination  of  School  Chil- 
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Sachs The  American  Secondary  School       i.io 

Sisson Essentials  of  Character      ...       i.oo 

Smith All  the  Children  of  All  the  People 

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Sneath  and  Hodges     .     Moral  Training  in  the  School  and 

Home 80 

Starch  ......     Educational  Measurements     .     .       1.25 

Experiments  in  Educational  Psy- 
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Stray er A  Brief  Course  in  the  Teaching 

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StrayerandNorsworthy    How  to  Teach 1.30 

Strayer  and  Thomdike    Education  Administration.  Quan- 
titative Studies       2.00 

Taylor Handbook  of  Vocational  Education     i.oo 

Principles  and  Methods  of  Teach- 
ing Reading 90 

Thorndike      ....    Education:  A  First  Book   .     .     .       1.25 

Vandewalker.     .     .     .    Kindergarten,  The,  in  American 

Education 1.25 

Ward The  Montessori  Method  and  the 

American  School 1.25 

Wayland How  to  Teach  American  History      i.io 


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